


Into You

by honestys_easy



Category: American Idol RPF
Genre: American Idol - RPS, Dating, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-09-14
Updated: 2007-11-21
Packaged: 2017-12-05 07:40:00
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 27,075
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/720524
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/honestys_easy/pseuds/honestys_easy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A series of events in the lives of Chris Richardson and Blake Lewis, loosely based on the chapters of the book He's Just Not That Into You.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. …If He's Not Asking You Out

> **Chapter One  
>  …If He's Not Asking You Out**
> 
> **_December 2006_**   
> 

“Brandon Rogers?” Gina pointed a finger at the tall man at the other end of the performance hall.

A.J. shook his head, giving the raven-haired singer a frown. “You’re not even playing fair now, girl. A blind gerbil can see Brandon’s gay.”

Sighing contentedly, Gina sank back down in the theater chair, eyeing the crowd and what remained of the competition. She had been to Hollywood week before in the coveted singing competition, but she had never gotten this far, and it was a bit trying on her nerves. Her fast friend A.J. Tabaldo, however, a smiling, tiny bundle of anxiety and optimism, was faring far worse. So to take his mind off the next cut of talent she had instigated a game of Guess the Gay – and she, apparently, was winning.

She focused her attention on a tall, bald man with cocoa skin who appeared to be talking up a young competitor with bouncy ringlets, oblivious to the fact that she was only seventeen. “Jared Cotter?” she asked. “He seems to be overcompensating for something.”

Cocking an eyebrow, A.J. turned in the direction Gina indicated, looking deep in thought. “Nah,” he said after a moment, dismissing the older man with a wave of his hand. “He likes vagina way too much, you can tell.”

“What about Sundance?”

A.J. almost looked offended to be lumped into the same sexual orientation as Sundance Head. “I thought you said you have gaydar, girl!”

Gina threw her head back into a full laugh, her sudden outburst startling others around her. It was great to be able to relax like this, not to think for twenty minutes or so that how this next week was determining her career and her future. For all of them, really – but what the men furiously practicing and the young girls fretting in the corner didn’t realize was that talent was only a small part of the package of being the American Idol. Personality, and acting like you belonged there, like it was natural, was just as important.

It looked like A.J. was realizing this as well, letting himself go a little and giggling at his own joke, nose scrunching up in amusement. “Okay, my turn,” he said, referring to the game that had no set rules but ended up being fun for the pair regardless. He pointed to a short, spiky-haired blond leaning against the stage, his hands nervously tapping out a beat heard only in his own head. “Blake Lewis,” he said more than asked, admiring his own observation.

“I can certainly see where you’re coming from,” Gina narrowed her eyes at the beatboxer who had garnered much attention from both the producers and the other contestants. “I think that boy owns more purple shirts than I do. But his eccentricities could be just that; he may just really like shitty 80’s music and gaudy jewelry.” Gina shrugged; she had known guys like Blake all her life, the ones that set off that internal alarm in her head when they were a bit too eager to watch “Rules of Attraction” or took longer than her to get ready to go out. She had learned from experience that a closet full of purple shirts does not a gay man make. “I’m on the fence about him; I just don’t know.”

“Suit yourself,” A.J. shrugged, taking a quick swig from his water bottle as he watched Blake beatbox to himself out of nervousness. “There’s a fine line between metrosexual and gay, my dear; I know it well. And Blake’s line is shiny, neon pink and covered in glitter.”

Gina smirked as the young man snapped his fingers, waving his head as if to say, _think what you will but give me four days and a happy hour and I will prove you wrong._ Another man caught her attention from the corner of her eye; he was pacing around the slick black grand piano on stage, hands nervously touching the keys, fiddling with the rolled up sleeves of a tailored shirt. He seemed to be paying attention to nothing and no one, his anxiety over the competition so bad Gina could see he was sweating through his shirt from here.

“Talk about your fine lines,” she tapped A.J. on the shoulder, nodding her head in the direction of the young man onstage. “They don’t get any finer than Chris Richardson.”

Almost immediately A.J. put his hands up defensively, shaking his head furiously at his new friend. “Absolutely not,” he said, causing Gina to frown. This game had just started to get fun. “We are not talking about Chris’s sexuality. Not happening.”

“But why?” Gina tried not to whine, but A.J. was making it difficult for her to get her way otherwise. “He’s big, beefy – got that whole jock thing going for him, I guess.” She shrugged; she was never really into the overly muscular type herself, but she wouldn’t turn down one over that fact, either. “I always thought jocks were the closet kinky ones; all those communal showers.” She then turned a contemplative eye to the man onstage, who was now expending his energy stretching and releasing two rubber bands on his wrist. “But he’s got this shy, sensitive side to him…God, bet he calls his mother everyday. He’s an anomaly, that one; a gay in jock’s clothing.”

Gina turned her head, grinning at A.J. but all she caught from him was a stern frown. “You don’t listen, do you bitch?” he said jokingly, to which Gina responded with a stuck-out tongue and a choice finger. “I didn’t want to talk about Chris because, number one, he’s my roommate, and number two, he’s got the ability to kick my ass if I even breathe at him funny.” He ticked the reasons off on his fingers and Gina rolled her eyes; though the well-built Chris Richardson looked intimidating, the kindness in his eyes and the way he always held the door for any of the ladies convinced her otherwise. “But since you brought it up…” A.J. relaxed as Gina flashed a triumphant smile. “He’s tricky to read. Some things set it off, really seem like he is; others just fall short.” A.J. scratched his chin, deep in thought. “Maybe he is and he’s trying to hide it. Maybe he is and he doesn’t even know it.”

“Maybe he thinks he’s not gay if he doesn’t swallow,” mumbled Gina as she sipped her water. This cute game was getting a little too in-depth, too personal – A.J. looked a little uneasy bringing up his roommate in this, considering he had to keep a straight face with the guy more than anyone else here. Perhaps they really should be working on their performances or collaborating with others, instead of just being catty with one another.

A sharp nudge lifted Gina out of her thoughts, and A.J. pointed in the direction of the stage. “Looks like we’ve gotten our answers, Gina Beena.”

She followed his gaze; there, at the foot of the stage, the shorter, spiked-hair an had moved over to where the younger man had been pacing, now seated at the piano, feet nervously tapping on the wooden floor. Playfully Blake began to tap out the same rhythm with his fingers, first on the edge of the stage tentatively, soon creeping over to pad against Chris’s sneakers, the movement of the other man’s fingers stilling them.

Bright, relaxed smiles spread over both men’s faces, Chris’s shoulders releasing the nervous tension built up over the past few days, Blake’s anxious fingers now finding a purpose to their incessant beat. His toes feeling the vibrations of Blake’s drumming through his shoes, Chris turned his upper body towards the piano keys, flicking out a quick melody to match Blake’s beat. The older man’s face lit up, his excitement no longer about the competition, and soon his mouth was accompanying the drum of his fingers, laying down the foundation to Chris’s light, upbeat tune.

The pair in the audience could do very little but watch, mouths hanging slightly open, at how in tune the two became at the piano, and so quickly after meeting one another. The two men played on, oblivious to not only the two game players but to the rest of the audience that just noticed the beautiful music floating through the venue. What Gina and A.J. saw was not about gay or straight; it was attraction, plain and simple affection for qualities that defied gender. They almost felt like they were intruding upon an intimate moment by watching them, though it would be only the first in a string of countless collaborations behind a piano and a beat between the two.

Gina spoke first; clearing her throat as Chris grinned unimaginably wide at a beatboxing technique Blake had told her earlier was called “The Snarling Dragon.” “Um…yeah.” She coughed out, catching a sideways glance at A.J., who had a shocked look on his face. “I think our gaydars were both malfunctioning on these two.”

A.J. swallowed, wondering how he was going to look Chris in the eye again when the taller man mentioned wanting to meet another girl like his ex-girlfriend. “Honey, I think these two fucking broke our gaydar.”

The next few days would be filled with anxiety-laden performances, emotional reviews, and heartbreaking cuts to get to the Top 24. But from A.J. and Gina’s vantage point, Chris Richardson and Blake Lewis were going to spend it together, sharing laughs, soft, friendly glances, and perhaps more. Hollywood Week would be the end for the dreams of many hopefuls in that auditorium, but for those two, it was sure, their first instant connection over a melody and a beat was a bright new beginning.


	2. …If He's Not Calling You

> **Chapter Two  
>  …If He's Not Calling You**
> 
> **_February 2007_**   
> 

“I sure hope you’ve got a killer billing plan on that thing.”

Chris looked up, surprised at the sudden remark that came from the bald man. “What? Phil, I –“ He cut himself off; he didn’t need to say to the older man that he had no idea what he was talking about, both men would know that it would certainly be a lie. He looked down at the electric blue phone clutched at his side, its display light blinking as a short, staccato vibration told him he had received yet another text. He knew exactly what Phil Stacey was talking about.

Pointing to the phone in Chris’s hand, Phil gave a knowing look, nodding as he munched on a potato wedge. “It hasn’t stopped since we got here. I think it even rang a few times when we were in the car, man.” It had, Chris mused, and they weren’t even texts those times, they were flat-out phone calls that caused the young man to blush and duck his head shyly, hastily pressing the “ignore” button before the others in the car could see.

“I guess I’m just popular,” Chris mumbled, failing to hide his grin as he drowned a potato wedge into a dark pool of barbecue sauce. It was strange, he thought, that although he had been receiving daily phone calls from his worried mother and a steady flow of hellos and well-wishes from seemingly every resident of Virginia, tonight was different. Tonight was the first night he stayed glued to his phone, reluctant to even put it down on the vinyl booth seat next to him for fear he’d miss just one text. 

Stabbing at errant pieces of lettuce in her Caesar salad, Haley strained her neck from across the table, eager to catch a glimpse of the name on Chris’s display screen. “You’re not _that_ popular, honey.” Her tone made Chris want to bite his tongue and hold back the warning that she had a large piece of lettuce stuck between her teeth. “Who keeps calling you?”

Chris took an unnecessarily large bite of his hamburger so that Haley would forget she ever asked her question by the time he finished chewing. Considering the ramifications a truthful response would create – and how many follow-up questions it would result in from basically anyone within earshot – kept Chris’s mouth shut.

“Probably Lauren Conrad,” Sligh muttered over his steak, the passing comment meant as a jab to the most recent rumors circulating around his eponymous competitor and not in the least meant as the truth. Haley gave a gasp in mock surprise, putting a hand over her heart and began to prattle on with Sligh about the most recent celebrities to be lampooned by Perez Hilton.

As the other two got heavily into their conversation, Chris took the time to switch on the small blue phone at his side, ducking it under the table for good measure just in case the name on his speed dial was spied by any wandering eyes. He was hoping that Haley and Sligh would be too engrossed to eavesdrop on a quick phone call, and Phil…well, Chris always felt the older man was a bit clueless at times – lovable, and a great friend, but not the most perceptive guy around – so he felt at ease making the call in front of him. He felt a strange bit of relief wash over him as the voice on the other end of the line answered.

“Rich, you’ve been incommunicado for the whole fucking night. What the hell, dude?”

Chris’s eyes nearly bulged out of his skull as the voice came blaring out of the speakerphone. Muttering a curse under his breath, he quickly switched off the function on the phone, blushing as he noticed the sound of the voice went nearly unheeded by Haley and Sligh, and Phil who was trying to catch the attention of the waitress for more water. 

“We’re eating,” Chris was trying to keep his voice low, but Phil heard it over the din of the restaurant, his ears perking up in interest. He could only hear the younger man’s side of the conversation and he tried not to look like he was actively listening – if Phil Stacey was any kind of a man at this point in his life he was a _polite_ man. But it was apparent from Chris’s hushed tones and the slight blush on his cheeks that this was an important call, that this was  the insistent caller.

Phil looked on, appearing to be extremely interested in his sandwich, as Chris’s conversation went on, a flash of concern on the man’s face. “Well, your text said it was urgent; are you dying or something? We talked about that before. I –“ Crisp green eyes rolled heavenward, fingers tapping anxiously on the formica table. “We’ll be home in like, an hour, okay? We can finish the song then.” Phil raised an eyebrow at this – apparently whoever was on the other end of the line was waiting, a bit too impatiently, for Chris and the others to get back to the Idol apartments. Phil had a feeling he knew who was calling, if only from the way that Chris’s eyes shined while listening to the other voice on the phone, but he wasn’t positive…

A deep sigh erupted from Chris’s body as he brushed his hand over short-clipped hair, eyebrows knitting together with concern. “Man, you sound like shit. Didn’t you take the Nyquil yet…I left it out for you; if you don’t take it you know you’re gonna –“ Chris chuckled, the blush in his cheeks deepening, head ducked self-consciously towards his dinner. “Well, that’s very sweet of you. Dumb, but sweet. I know…I know you missed me, but ten texts in three hours is a bit excessive. Don’t wait up, you’ll be a wreck tomorrow morning. Get some sleep…yeah, we’ll see if I ever finish that song with you if you keep calling me your mother. Oedipus complex much?”

Chris laughed deeply, the lines of his face creasing with amusement, and as he marked his goodbyes to the mystery caller, Phil finally realized it. The look on Chris’s face, the ease with which he spoke like Phil had never seen on the younger man…that other voice brought it out in Chris, coaxed and trained the confidence and genuine friendliness out into the open, brightening his entire demeanor. Phil knew that feeling well, the strengthening, rejuvenating feeling he received every time he looked deep into his wife’s eyes, or heard the sound of his eldest daughter’s voice over the telephone. That voice…that voice brought an entire new person out of Chris, revealing something special and formerly guarded about the younger man.

“So…” Phil nibbled contemplatively on a potato wedge as he watched Chris click the phone off, the lingering remnants of a smile still on his lips. “Blake feeling any better?”

“He won’t take any Nyquil, the fucker wants to wait up for me…” Chris muttered out before he could stop himself, cheeks burning crimson as he bit his flow of words back into his throat. He looked over at Phil with wide, nervous eyes; he didn’t know just how Phil knew it was Blake on the other end of the line, couldn’t fathom how much the older man gleaned from Chris’s end of the conversation or if he saw through his thinly-disguised words the intimacy of their exchange. He silently cursed himself for letting those words slip; he cursed Blake for nearly demanding the phone call. He cursed anyone in range for making this something he felt he needed to hide.

But Phil gave a reassuring smile, deep-set eyes full of sincerity. “We’ll stop by a Rite Aid, pick up something non-drowsy.” He watched as Chris self-consciously sucked his bottom lip into his mouth, eyes worried and uncertain, as his gaze flickered over to Haley and Sligh for the briefest of moments. Phil shook his bald head; some of the contestants thought he was a bit clueless, but he wasn’t stupid. “Don’t worry; I’m not going to say anything to anyone.” He realized how important privacy and discretion must have been for them, particularly if no other contestants yet knew about this. “…Until the both of you want me to.”

Chris’s gaze fell down to his food, his voice so low and guarded Phil had to strain to hear him. “I don’t really know what’s going on right now,” he divulged, his body feeling lighter from the simple act of telling someone else, of releasing the burdens of his anxiety if only for a little while. They had only kissed, once, but the feelings Chris had swimming through his mind that were enhanced by Blake’s self-confidence and smooth, unforced affection…now, those were the things that truly scared him. “Things…are complicated.”

Phil put a hand out on the table, a small gesture of sympathy, but his words meant the world to Chris. “That’s only if you make them complicated. No one ever got an ulcer from a simple, open life.” Phil’s smile was warm, his advice downright paternal, and Chris couldn’t help but nod appreciatively, though the thought of his life getting too out in the open still left him unhinged and holding his breath. Phil pressed a thumb and forefinger against his own lips, moving them across like a zipper; his lips were sealed, he was telling Chris this twice now in the span of two minutes. As Sligh and Haley’s conversation wound down to a close, Chris knew that he could trust him with this, with his secret, so long as he and Blake needed him to.

“Well, I am just _stuffed_ ,” Haley declared, patting her diminutive stomach as she pushed away her empty plate to the middle of the table. “If anyone’s getting dessert, I’ll pass.”

Sligh made a clipped, inquisitive noise in his throat, reaching for his soda. “Huh. So I guess that chunk of lettuce in your teeth is your snack for later, then.” Chris flinched, horribly failing at keeping a straight face as Haley’s hands flew to cover her mouth in embarrassment. “Phil, you gonna finish that turkey melt?”

Passing his plate across the table with a shake of his head, Phil caught Chris’s stare in the corner of his eye, the clear green shining full of relief and gratitude. The older man nodded once in Chris’s direction, his expression making it clear to Chris that no thank-yous were necessary. Quickly Phil turned to the other competitors at the table, suggesting a quick stop-over at an all-night pharmacy for Haley’s dental floss, among other things.


	3. …If He's Not Dating You

> **Chapter Three  
>  …If He's Not Dating You**
> 
> **_March 2007_**   
> 

“You. Me. Big fucking tub of popcorn. _Fracture._ Whaddya say?”

Blake forgot exactly when Chris no longer needed to talk to him in full sentences for him to understand him. His teeth absently gnawed at the corner of his lip as he watched the other man shut down the keyboard, his concentration and creativity blocked for the day by a particularly bad review Blake should have known to keep out of sight.

Taking Blake’s silence as a request for more information, Chris continued. “The new Anthony Hopkins movie; it’s playing at the Grove.” He yawned then, stretching his well-toned arms over his head, his entire body leaning toward the exhaustion of performing in the restless, perpetual competition. Blake watched every muscle strain and stress into the yawn, biceps growing taut, neck stretching and twisting, revealing a pulsing vein that left the beatboxer yearning to feel that pulse quicken under his mouth.

The fleeting look of lust flashing in Blake’s eyes didn’t go unnoticed by Chris; he smiled deviously, differing so very much from the sweet one he gave the television cameras and his grandmother. “Plus, I need to get the hell out of this place,” he added. “Do something normal for once.”

“Sounds like a plan,” Blake shrugged, trying not to show from the smile spreading on his face that he’d probably see a full-feature film of the Wiggles as long as he was sitting in the theater with Chris. “Lemme go get Gina, see if she wants to go…I think Mindy’s a big Hopkins fan, I’ll go check…”

Chris cut him off with a choice clearing of his throat; stopping Blake mid-stride watching his friend – at times with benefits – sitting on the keyboard bench. “I really don’t feel like dealing with those two drooling over Ryan Gosling right now,” he waved the suggestion away with a dismissive hand. “How ‘bout just you and me? It’ll be just a Cake thing.” Chris flashed Blake a cheesy grin, knowing full well the older man hated being reminded of the fans’ coined term for the more-than-friendly attraction the two men shared. The one that apparently the rest of the world realized before they did. “Then maybe get something to eat afterwards, you know I’ll be starving once we get out –“

But Blake had stopped listening at this point, his brain still attempting to wrap around the idea of him and Chris going to a movie, alone together – and what’s more, that Chris had even suggested it. The possibilities and implications of Chris’s suggestion rushed through his mind: they were great friends – hell, over the past two weeks Chris felt like a second home to Blake, the connection between them on a much higher plane than merely friendly or purely sexual. Yes, they had kissed in that dingy, empty corridor, an excited, drunken mash of lips against one another, when they reached the Top 12. And they had certainly taken it to a new level less than a week ago, when the template of the perennial football jock that tortured Blake in high school pressed throbbing cock against lips, taking Blake in until Blake came, gasping, fingers digging deep into firm shoulders. The two were far beyond just friends at this point.

But just what they were…well, now that was the question.

A hand waving across Blake’s line of vision snapped him out of his deep thoughts. “You still there, B?” asked Chris, a playful smile on his lips, and he knew that he had caught Blake daydreaming about something.

He didn’t mean for the words to come out – he was going to be completely satisfied with pretending nothing was different between them, that they could go to the movies and throw popcorn at the screen and then come home and suck each other off. But the words spilled out of his mouth like an uncontrollable rhythm, and the minute he said them he knew he’d regret it.

“Dude, this sounds perilously close to a date.”

Blake’s words caused Chris to stop short; he was about to rise from the piano bench to change into a new shirt and find some clean socks, but he sank back down, anchored by Blake’s almost accusing tone. He hadn’t meant anything sinister or subversive about it, but it seemed like Blake might think he did. It was a bit silly after all, he supposed, to think that they could go on with their relationship the way it was without talking about it. Without Blake acknowledging that it was more than just getting ass or Chris realizing that he felt more genuinely for Blake than he probably had ever felt with a woman before.

They were about to have that “talk” about the definition of their relationship that every man dreaded. And fuck, Chris had just wanted to go see a movie.

“I mean, I need to know that this is what you want.” Blake ran a nervous hand through dyed blond hair, his gaze now intently watching the floor. “If you want to be dating. Or more than just friends. Or something…something a little more concrete than this.” He waved his hand at the empty air between the two; it was only a yard, perhaps two, but at this moment, based on what they would want from this arrangement, it could be a canyon between them. “You want dinner, and a romantic movie, and you want us to go alone, and I just gotta know…are we dating at this point, Rich?”

It was a few seconds before Chris responded, could find the words with which to respond; Blake was throwing this all at him, and even though he’d anticipated it for a while, he always believed it would be him doing the asking, him demanding verification from Blake. It was Chris’s first time with another man; wasn’t he supposed to be the nervous one about it?

His voice was clear, as was his mind, when he finally did speak. It wasn’t about thinking whether he and Blake were in a relationship, if that was what he wanted or not; it was just about saying it. “I’d hardly call _Fracture_ a romantic movie, Blake; I hear Anthony Hopkins kills his wife in it. And God, I wasn’t thinking oysters by candlelight, I just wanted to get a burger after the movie.” His voice grew softer then, barely over a whisper and Blake had to strain his ears to hear him. “And yes, I’d love it to be a date…I’d love  us to date.”

This time it was the beatboxer who was rendered speechless; he attempted sounds from his mouth, trying to find his voice, but all it resulted in was an opening and closing of his lips in shock. His mind was still processing the younger man’s soft words, the words deep in his heart Blake had wanted to hear, when Chris spoke again.

“I want to walk through the Grove with you, hand in hand, and know that you’re mine. I want to touch you, every second of the day, and not give a fuck what Gwen Stefani has to say about it. I want to wake up next to you every morning and forget there’s another bed in the room.” Chris inhaled deeply, feeling a great weight lift off his shoulders as he said the words aloud to Blake – and to himself. “I want to call you my boyfriend, Blake, and I want to be yours.”

Chris then cocked an eyebrow at the older man, who had still said nothing to Chris since they started this conversation – since Blake himself had brought it up. Maybe this was too much; maybe it hadn’t been what Blake wanted to hear. “Too soon?” he asked, a sinking feeling burning in the pit of his stomach with every second of silence from the other man. “I know we should probably be taking this slow, but…”

His voice died as Blake approached him, his expression not one of shock or confusion but determination. He reached for Chris as he met the piano bench, a warm hand on his shoulder as Blake crouched down onto his knees, locking golden brown eyes with shining green. He didn’t verbalize an answer to Chris, didn’t have to, as he clasped the younger man’s head in his hands, thumbs gently rubbing friction against a two-day stubble, and pressed his lips to Chris’s. The kiss wasn’t rushed like their first, or laced with lust and promises of more like their last. It was simple yet solid, a confirmation of all the wants and desires they both shared. Blake breathed in, taking in Chris’s scent, his taste, all of the things his mind now recognized as familiar, as home.

When he broke the kiss, pulling away, he quickly chanced a glance at Chris’s face, his eyes still closed from the kiss, his head leaning in, moaning slightly from the disconnection. A soft smile played upon Blake’s lips as he ran a finger along Chris’s jawline, his heart jumping at the thought, _Yes, this is my boyfriend’s face; this is my boyfriend, and he is all mine._

“Can we go see _Hot Fuzz_ instead?”

Blake face broke out into a grin, all teeth and warmth, and for a fleeting moment Chris had to think to himself, what in the hell was he getting into committing to this crazy, wonderful man. He matched Blake’s grin as he rose from the bench, running a hand through the other man’s spiky hair affectionately. “In that case,” he said, as Blake followed close behind him towards their bedroom. “You’re paying for the popcorn.”


	4. …If He's Not Having Sex With You

> **Chapter Four  
>  …If He's Not Having Sex With You**
> 
> **_April 2007_**   
> 

With the amazingly adept way Chris was sucking his cock, crouched low on his haunches, taking him in fully as he leaned against the wall, Blake had to wonder if Chris lied to him and he wasn’t the first man the younger musician had ever been with.

He certainly couldn’t think now, though, as Chris’s tongue lapped at the sensitive underside of Blake’s cock, lustful green eyes closed in silent rapture. Blake couldn’t think of anything at that moment except for _wet, hot_ , and how he shuddered and groaned every time Chris’s stubble grazed against his thigh. Sweat beaded upon his forehead, his hands skimming through Chris’s short-clipped hair and Blake worried that with the way things were going, he wouldn’t be able to last very much longer.

“Fuck…Chris…” he moaned, resisting the urge to thrust forward and just fuck the younger man’s mouth, watch those glorious green eyes pop open in surprise. Blake had wanted to take this slow – by God, Chris had said just yesterday he wanted to be with Blake, an honest-to-goodness relationship with anniversary gifts, long walks on the beach and all that other shit. But it surprisingly was Chris that pinned Blake to the wall of their bedroom, kissing him hungrily as his fingers fumbled with Blake’s pants. Blake hadn’t wanted to rush Chris into something he wasn’t ready for, but it was painfully obvious that Chris wanted it all.

Chris responded with a flick of his tongue against Blake’s head, garnering a yelp and a shaky hiss from the older man. Blake could hardly take it anymore, Chris was just too much of a damn natural at sucking cock. Strings of words came pouring out of his mouth, his inability to keep his world silent drifting over into his sexual life as well. “That feels so good,” he moaned out, rolling his head back against the plaster. “God, you’re good at this, baby…nngh, want to be in you…” He pressed his hands at the back of Chris’s neck, and he felt the shudders transfer from his own body into Chris’s. “Just want to be inside you, Chris…”

“Then why aren’t you?” Chris had pulled away suddenly, leaving Blake gasping from the loss, and he looked down at his boyfriend to find two smoldering eyes staring back at him, Chris’s expression determined and lustful.

Blake found himself entranced by Chris’s mouth, slightly open in anticipation of Blake’s answer, lips slick and shining with a mix of spit and sweat and Blake’s precome. It took all his willpower not to just allow Chris to swallow him whole again, lose himself in that beautiful, skilled little mouth, and to think about what Chris just said. He wanted to do it, just lay Chris down and ravage him until the winter. But his conscience was nagging at him, reminding him that it wasn’t the first time he’d been with someone who’d never been with a man before, but it was definitely the first time Blake truly cared about the end result. He didn’t want to ruin anything with Chris because of sex; he didn’t want to push this too fast and too far and cause Chris to drift away from him. This relationship was special to both of them. Blake could feel it already and he’d be damned if he let sex get in the way of that.

Inching his way up his boyfriend’s body, lips grazing sweat-slicked skin, Chris moved to a standing position, his muscular frame towering over Blake, dangerously taking over personal space. He asked again, his voice husky and dark in Blake’s ear, hot breath tickling at his neck. “Why aren’t you inside me?”

Swallowing hard, Blake had to look away, away from those eyes that trapped his stare or else he’d never remember his reasoning and it could be all downhill from there. “I – but – ” he stuttered, trying to formulate his explanation, but Chris silenced him with a rough kiss, lips crushing together, their breaths mingling in Blake’s mouth along with hesitant words left unsaid.

“I want you to,” said Chris, almost pleading, eyes full of want and need as he skimmed his hands down Blake’s sides, fingertips trailing against skin. A finger grazed against the head of Blake’s cock more than deliberately, and Blake had to bite back the moan daring to escape his lips. “Blake…”

The older man looked into the clear green eyes staring back at him, reading Chris’s intentions and desires in that tell-tale gaze as he raised his hand to caress his cheek. There was certainly want in Chris’s darkened eyes, the lust nearly spilling out of his body, coming out of his pores, but there was something else there, something Blake could see in his own intentions about tonight. There was deep caring in Chris’s eyes, his touches, care for Blake and the fledgling connection they had developed. But instead of Blake’s uncertainty over what sex might do to their relationship, he saw only determination in Chris’s eyes, a silent pledge to both his boyfriend and himself that Chris wouldn’t allow sex to tear them apart.

Blake’s eyes widened as the realization hit him: Chris, just like Blake, wouldn’t let sex get in the way of the bond they shared. But he also wasn’t going to let that rule their relationship either.

With a carnal groan from deep in his throat, Chris moved his head to the side, capturing Blake’s fingers in his mouth, tongue wrapping around them instantly. The gentle bite of his teeth against knuckle seemed to be the only thing keeping Blake upright, his knees fighting not to buckle as sensation coursed through his body. It wasn’t just Chris sucking on his fingers, slowly coating them with deft flicks of his tongue, but the look in Chris’s eyes as he did it; he knew exactly what he wanted, what he wanted for them, and the fact that he knew exactly what he was doing turned Blake on more than any simple blowjob ever could.

“God, you look so fucking hot doing that,” Blake’s voice rose barely above a whisper as his other hand rested at the small of Chris’s back, pressing them closer together, groins grinding together with lustful urgency. “Chris…oh, _Chris_ …” It was getting tough to keep his cool, and he couldn’t fathom why: he’d had fingers sucked before, he’d been pressed against many a hard, hot body, but never had he felt so close to another person as he felt to Chris, right at that moment. He shivered as Chris released his fingers – my God, he reminded himself, those were only fingers he was sucking – and Chris’s silent yet pleading gaze urged him on.

He skimmed his hand down Chris’s chest, his eyes loving the sparking sea of green he had grown so fond of over the weeks, and fingers ran over Chris’s balls and underneath, garnering a surprised gasp of pleasure as Blake stopped right at his entrance. “This’ll hurt,” he warned, fingertips slowly pulsing around the hole, eyes widening as Chris’s fluttered shut, hips rolling back into Blake’s touch.

“I’m a big boy,” Chris nearly panted out, and he squeezed at Blake’s hips with his hands; God, did he want this, and more than anything he wanted it with Blake. “I can handle it…”

With a slight nod, Blake pressed a slick finger into Chris’s entrance, finding himself moaning uncontrollably at the tight heat he found there. Chris bit his lip at the burning intrusion, trying to convince his mind that yes, it was going to get better – much better – very soon. His boyfriend could see the discomfort etched into his face, could feel it in the tension of his body, and Blake craned his neck to place a gentle kiss against the corner of Chris’s open, panting mouth. Chris stifled a whimper at the display of affection Blake was giving to him, cooing calming noises into his ear, his free hand tracing small circles against the small of his back, as he pressed a finger deeper, slowly twisting, up to the knuckle. Blake curved his finger ever so slightly, smiling to himself as the look on Chris’s face changed dramatically, his eyes closing in pleasure, a groan rising from his lips.

Chris dropped his head forward, his arms shooting out to lean his body against Blake and the wall behind him. He arched his hips back, shoulders curved seductively into Blake, his lips kissing the older man’s neck, his collarbone, any skin they could reach. “Don’t stop,” he managed between lustful pants. “Oh God, don’t stop…”

His words were cut off with a strangled cry as Blake ran a second finger along Chris’s ass and inside, his own lips emitting a low hiss at the pressure there. “I wasn’t planning on it, baby,” he whispered, moving his free hand over to Chris’s hip, thumb resting against the bone as Chris arched his back into his touch. He loved hearing the moans and soft gasps coming from Chris, feeling his heart beat faster as their chests pressed flush against one another. He loved even more that he could make those sounds come from him, that he was giving his boyfriend all of this pleasure and it was nearly unhinging him.

“I want you,” Blake heard Chris muffle into his shoulder, the short nails of his boyfriend’s fingers digging into the plaster behind him. Chris reached down in between the two men, grasping Blake’s cock with a trembling hand, the shaft still wet and slick from Chris’s mouth before. Blake’s breath hitched in his throat, Chris’s grip far from gentle, and much more a reminder of what he really wanted, what they both desired. “I want you, Blake.”

God, this was all too much…Chris being so open, so ready to take it to this level with Blake, him practically begging for Blake to fuck him…if Blake hadn’t known any better, he’d think this was some elaborate practical joke. He felt a shudder and a gasp as he pulled his hand away, Chris’s hips pushing back, searching for the lost connection of Blake inside of him. Chris knew that it would soon be replaced, again by Blake, and dear Lord it would be amazing, but his logical mind had apparently taken a vacation as the feeling of Blake’s erect cock sliding underneath his, grazing against his balls, caused him to shiver with pleasure.

Blake tilted his head up, one hand cupping Chris’s chin, the other slowly guiding his cock to Chris’s entrance, prodding against the tight hole gently yet deliberately. His thumb grazed against the prickly stubble on Chris’s cheek as he forced him to look the other man in the eye. He wanted to watch Chris’s reaction to this, to make sure everything was okay and still pleasurable and that the younger man didn’t change his mind at any time. But more than that, Blake wanted to watch with lustful fascination the exact look on Chris’s face as he fucked him for the first time.

“Shit…” Chris said, the word quickly transforming into a sharp groan as his jaw dropped open, muted pain mixed with unmatchable, unbelievable pleasure, and soon he simply had no words to speak. He tried to catch his breath as sensation flooded his body, up his spine, and his brow creased as he concentrated on the feeling, the silent challenge Blake’s honey golden eyes proposed, forcing him to keep his eyes open.

Blake was definitely not disappointed.

The older man pressed himself in, inch by painstaking inch, until he buried himself fully inside of Chris, the tight heat of his body enveloping him, surrounding him, and it took all his willpower not to thrust and fuck the boy senseless right there. He stilled his desires, however, enjoying the feel of their still bodies joined together, the only sound between them their heavy pants, Chris’s eyes still locked onto Blake’s. And when they finally did begin to move in a slow, erotic rhythm, it was Chris that began it, his hips rolling back ever so slightly, a tentative request for Blake to move, to thrust, to just go ahead and fuck him already because if all they did their first time together was just stand there…

Unable to withstand Chris’ challenging stare any longer, Blake pressed forward with his lips, his body, his heart, kissing Chris passionately as he started a steady rhythm with his hips thrusting himself in deeper. He found himself not saying a word while he was inside of Chris, content to listen to the slap of sweaty, glistening skin against skin, the sound of Chris’s heartbeat getting more and more erratic by the second. He seemed to thrive on the little gasps his boyfriend made when he hit that spot deep inside him, wanting to hit that every time and as often as possible, just so he could hear that noise come from Chris’s mouth every single time. For perhaps the first time ever during sex, Blake Lewis was struck speechless by his partner.

Soon Blake could feel the erratic tremble of Chris’s lips against his, the urgent push of the younger man’s hips growing unbalanced against Blake’s thrusts. He was close, that was easy enough to tell, and fuck, Blake hadn’t even gone near his dick the whole time. Smiling to himself slightly at the near triumph of making his boyfriend come without even touching him, Blake sped up his pace, the familiar slow burn in his gut pushing him on.

Chris was so close his knees almost buckled twice, both times mumbling an apology Blake was too distracted to hear. God, the sensations Blake was giving him, these amazing feelings…Chris would hardly say the first time he had sex with Blake he felt completed – there were far too many emotions and levels of intimacy the two men had yet to explore. But that feeling of fullness, of Blake fitting perfectly in a hole in Chris’s life no woman ever filled…that was as close to complete as Chris had ever felt before.

Chris nearly bit down on Blake’s probing tongue in his mouth when the older man took hold of his cock, a gentle yet steady hand gripping at the shaft, a thumb swiping over the sensitive head. It was all Chris needed to send him over the edge, his cock jerking in Blake’s sure grasp, his startled cries moaned into Blake’s open mouth. Everything about this orgasm was Blake: Blake beside him, Blake all around him, Blake deep inside of him, and just the thought alone that the beatboxer could be all those things to him all at once made him shudder with emotion.

The tightness of Chris’s opening only grew worse as he came, his body tensing in a mind-numbing, enlightening orgasm, and it left Blake reeling, letting propriety screw itself as he thrust roughly and shamelessly into Chris, a low moan escaping his throat as he came. He usually thought of nothing as he came, or thought about how great he felt, how sore he was going to be in the morning. But this time, thoughts of joy filled his mind that it was him who was responsible for Chris’s orgasm, how amazing and strangely fantastic it felt to have the younger man’s come striped down his stomach and coating his fingers. How he almost made Chris come just with his fingers.

Blake gave out a breathy sigh, slipping out of Chris silently as he schemed up future encounters where he wanted to do just that.

Suddenly a heavy weight pressed against his body; Chris’s battle with gravity was finally lost, and his knees gave out from underneath him, causing him to slide to the floor. Blake traveled down with him, guiding arms on Chris’s hips doing the best he possibly could to ease the much larger man down on the ground safely. Honey brown eyes met with sparkling green, for the first time since they made love, and it relieved Blake to no end to see them glistening, smiling, elated over what they had just done. He raised a hand to Chris’s face, fingers tracing his strong jawline, and his heart did a small jump as Chris leaned forward and wrapped his arms around Blake, hugging him tightly.

“I just…” Chris stuttered, and Blake was surprised to hear his voice sound choked up, as if he were holding back tears. “I’m glad…happy…that you…that it’s you…” It was so difficult to get out the emotions Chris was feeling; this amazing high he got being in Blake’s arms that was just as good, maybe even better than the sex they just had. He looked down, frustrated with the apparent deficiencies in the English language to describe how much what he and Blake shared meant to him.

But he didn’t need to say the words; Blake already knew, already understood that what they had was special and after this he realized that Chris felt the same way. Cupping Chris’s chin in his hand, the texture of the stubble invigorating Blake through his fingertips, he lifted the other man’s head up, eyes locked onto his. “I know,” he said, barely over a whisper. “I’m glad, too.” Smiling, relieved beyond measure that this appeared to be the first time of many with Chris Richardson, Blake pulled his boyfriend close to him, leaning in for a tender kiss.


	5. …If He's Having Sex With Someone Else

> **Chapter Five  
>  …If He's Having Sex With Someone Else**
> 
> **_April 2007_**   
> 

Chris slammed the door nearly off its hinges, the metal clanging loudly against the cool, black tiles of the familiar sleek décor of Les Deux’s bathroom. He followed closely behind Blake, determined not to let the shorter man out of his sight so that he could slip away to allow Chris’s anger to settle. With the way Blake had been acting that night, Chris wasn’t even going to let him piss without hearing a piece of his mind.

“What the fuck do you think you’ve been doing tonight?” His words were hard and biting and he was sure that if he wasn’t buzzed at this moment he would never be saying things like this to Blake, much less in a public bathroom. But he did have a buzz, and he was demanding an explanation from his boyfriend none too subtlety, and he was damned if Blake didn’t deserve it.

Loosened by a few drinks himself, Blake attempted to ignore his boyfriend’s question and the fact that he had followed him into the bathroom for no other reason except to yell at him. He looked away, avoiding Chris’s glare, but the younger man was full of determination and anger, and he pinned Blake against the wall roughly, hands balling into fists against the tile next to Blake’s head.

“What?!” he shouted again, and Blake almost hated to look into those eyes, the bright green of summer that Blake constantly lost himself in, as they stared back at him, full of rage.

But look into them he did, and it nearly broke his heart to see all that anger and frustration directed towards him. “Can we…can we not do this here?” His voice was uncharacteristically calm and it surprised even him. He looked over to his right with shifting eyes and Chris briefly followed his gaze; one man was in the bathroom with them, leaning over the urinal, expelling a waterfall out his dick. Blake didn’t want to have this conversation at all with Chris, but he certainly didn’t want it with another drunken guy listening in on their argument.

And from the looks of the vein popping out of Chris’s neck, this was definitely going to turn into an argument.

Chris set his jaw, saying nothing but conceding, pushed open the closest stall door – the large handicapped stall that always tended to smell a little less foul than the others – and pulled Blake inside with him. He didn’t want to say that Blake was right to his face – though he definitely was, since it wouldn’t be a good idea having a fight in front of others – so he kept silent, holding onto his anger as best he could.

When he spoke again, his voice still held its edge but his eyes lost the rage in them that had worried Blake before. Now all that was left was confusion, and underlying hurt. The older man grimaced, not knowing which one was worse. “Why are you so damn interested in pointing out every single vagina in the club to me, Blake?”

Blake flinched from the words and the accusation, turning his head to avoid those eyes that at this moment he almost feared. “Aw, come on…” he tried to dodge the question, wishing that he was anywhere in the world right now but in that stall, pinned against the wall by his pissed-off boyfriend.

But Chris refused to let him push this aside; if they were in a relationship, a serious commitment together, Chris wasn’t going to let this slide and eventually wedge them apart. He mimicked Blake’s voice, glazed over by alcohol, and repeated back to him the remarks that threw up red flags all over the exclusive club. “’Yo, Rich, check out the titties on that one, wouldn’t you like to take that home with you? Hey, you like blondes, don’t you? Oh, look over there, that’s a Gayle look-alike if I’ve ever seen one –‘“

“Enough,” Blake cut him off, knowing that the last remark he made had been the harshest, the one that prompted Chris to follow him into this bathroom and confront him on his strange behavior. He hated hearing his own words thrown back at him, aware that they hurt everyone involved, but he sighed heavily, knowing that what he was doing…it would be for the best, anyway.

Chris pulled his bottom lip into his mouth, biting it self-consciously, all of the initial shock and anger of Blake’s actions burned through, leaving only the confusion. “What is going on, Blake?” he asked, Blake’s heart going out to the vulnerable tone of Chris’s voice. “Why are you pushing me towards women tonight?…Why are you pushing me away from you?”

It was the question Blake was hoping, praying, Chris wouldn’t ask. It was the issue he wanted to sweep under the rug and never think about again without feeling the pain in his heart. Blake lifted his eyes away from the floor and it was the worst mistake of the night – Chris’s eyes trapped his own, soft and questioning and so very much the Chris Blake had quickly fallen for this spring. He couldn’t lie to those gracefully green eyes, couldn’t avoid the issue or act like nothing was going on. It was time to tell Chris everything.

He sighed heavily, the honey gold flecks in his eyes darkening to a deep brown. “You’re not the first straight guy I’ve been with, Chris,” he began, wishing he had the willpower to look away from Chris’s provoking gaze but failed. “You know that. And I know how all this works out.” He ran a hand through his blond hair, kept soft and gel-free, the way his boyfriend preferred it. “The guys I’ve been with…they were gung-ho about pride and all that shit early on, sure. They acted like I had shown them the light, like they finally understood who they were deep inside, whatever.”

Chris wrapped his mind around every word Blake spoke, keenly fascinated not only with the reason for Blake’s behavior tonight but to hear about his romantic past – a special part of Blake Chris knew little about. He nodded once, urging the older man to continue. “But after a while…” Blake swallowed; it had always been painful to bring back these memories, even moreso at this moment. “They went back to their old girlfriends, or just got bored of the scene…they got bored of me.”

He looked up into Chris’s eyes, and for one of the few times since he’d known the young musician, they were unreadable. “And whatever, I guess; they don’t really matter anymore. But you…” And this was when it started to get difficult. “You do matter. So if the inevitable is going to happen and you’re going to leave me, I’d rather have it on my terms. Fast, clean jerk – like a Band-Aid.” He didn’t even notice his eyes were watery until his vision of Chris’s face grew blurry, and he blinked, tears wetting his lashes. “’Cause dammit, Chris, I fell so fast and so fucking hard for you, if you drag this out and not mean it I don’t think I can take it.”

Blake thought it would all be over there; Chris would either realize that Blake was talking perfect sense and they’d go back to their apartment and never speak of the passion that burned so hot and so briefly. Or he’d think that Blake was an overemotional nutcase and would want nothing to do with him anyway. Chris raised a hand up to touch Blake’s face, his eyes unreadable but his lingering tenderness leading the older man to believe it was the precursor to a nostalgic touch of skin, a goodbye embrace.

Blake had not anticipated a third option.

With a sudden fierceness, Chris’s usual soft caress of Blake’s cheek rose upward, tangling roughly into dyed blond hair and grabbing at it, yanking Blake’s head up. There was something different on Chris’s face, a set jaw and cold green eyes foreign to the beatboxer. But there was also something else behind that veneer, something raw and carnal and very familiar to Blake: _desire._

Using the hand in Blake’s hair for leverage, Chris pulled the other man towards him, attacking his lips with teeth and tongue and a dominating need even Chris didn’t know he had inside him. Blake’s mouth crushed against his, not even giving the man time for a response or even to moan as Chris’s tongue explored everywhere inside, claiming it as his own. He pulled the other man’s bottom lip in between waiting sets of teeth, the intensity of it all telling Blake that he was no longer in control of the situation.

“You’re such a fucking idiot, Blake.” Chris ran a hand down Blake’s side, squeezing at flesh and finally coming to rest at the waistband of his pants. Blake gasped, hips arching away from the bathroom wall and towards his boyfriend’s touch. Chris’s exploring fingers dipped underneath the fabric, connecting with hot skin, the touch nearly burning Blake from the inside out. The younger man took hold of Blake’s mouth once again, covering it with his own as he deftly undid Blake’s pants, the pull of the zipper seeming louder to Blake’s ears than the bold, thumping music of the club outside those bathroom tiles.

There was no one left in the bathroom now save for the two men: the one last drunken straggler had gone, sensing tension between these two and choosing not to stick around lest it become a fight. Chris could have let go of Blake’s hair at any time, could have let him buck his hips and moan as loud as he wanted when he reached into Blake’s pants and cupped his growing erection, squeezing and kneading with burgeoning experience. But he liked the control of the situation, loved how the vibrations felt when Blake moaned shamelessly into his mouth, under his control. From what Blake had been planning when he had control, it looked like Chris had to step in to steer them in a different direction.

“You compare me to all those other guys you’ve been with, but you should know by now that I’m not one of them.” Chris’s guitarist fingers, rough and calloused at the tips yet gentle enough for a lullaby, stoked against Blake’s cock from shaft to tip, squeezing slightly at the head. Blake wondered how the fuck Chris got so good at knowing exactly what made him squirm. “Because I’m still here. And I’m not trying to use you or find myself through you; I’d think you’d know me better than that.”

“I know,” Blake managed as his breathing grew heavy, Chris’s grip on his cock tightening as his pants slowly slid off of his hips. “I do –“

Chris cut him off abruptly with another tug at his hair; Blake hissed in discomfort, but the pleasure came back twofold as Chris’s other hand traveled lower to caress his balls. “You already had your time to talk,” he growled in Blake’s ear, pausing only to dart out his tongue and catch a falling bead of sweat from his boyfriend’s brow. “And I didn’t like what you had to say. So now it’s my turn.”

His hand moved lower still, and Blake’s eyes widened, feeling a determined finger prodding at his entrance. He moaned with abandon as Chris slowly circled the fleshy hole, Blake’s hips rolling against Chris’s hand, not caring that the flimsy aluminum door of the stall shook and rattled with each thrust. These incredible feelings Chris was giving him, the mix of pleasure and pain. Blake never thought he was particularly into this kind of shit, but he was into Chris taking charge, he was sure about that. He just didn’t want to have to piss him off this much to see this side to him again.

“I’m not here to pick up some star-hitching blonde and fuck her in some club corner.” A finger slipped into Blake, calloused and full, Chris not even allowing Blake time to think on the fact that he was still fucking a blonde in a dark corner of Les Deux, just not the way Chris would have imagined seven months ago. “I don’t want any of them out there, Blake. I want you…in here.” He pressed deeper into Blake, his finger in to the knuckle and just left it there, stilling his movements as he felt the shudder run through Blake’s body.

It was a few seconds before either man moved, Chris enjoying the feel of Blake’s tight heat, and Blake in too much of a buzzed euphoria to do much at this point without Chris first taking the initiative. A shiver went down his spine as he realized, he liked Chris taking the initiative.

And then oh, Chris was moving that finger inside of him, slow and deliberate at first but then rougher, harder, Blake feeling every upstroke like critical mass, like he was going to die and come alive all at once. He thrust against the finger, itching for more contact with Chris, just fucking more, and he just hoped to God no paparazzi randomly stumbled into the bathroom to hear him moan out Chris’s name.

Blake felt a second finger slip inside of him, and he almost slid to the ground right there, had he not been held up by Chris’s strong, solid body. “I thought…” Chris’s voice grew softer, lost the angry bite to it that Blake’s actions caused before. The hand tangled in Blake’s hair softened as well, releasing its dominating grip on the strands and now simply caressing Blake’s head, thumb ghosting over the hairline. “I thought I showed you the other night that it’s you. That it’s only you I want.”

Chris pressed in closer to Blake, the desire coursing through him evident even through the heavy cloth of his jeans. Blake thrust against the rough fabric, against Chris, desperate for the friction against his own cock, his hips doing a strange alternating dance of thrusting up against Chris and back to accommodate the ever-pressing fingers inside of him. He didn’t know how much longer he could stand like this…it was all getting to be too much. If Chris just pushed his fingers deeper once more, just grazed over that spot inside him, Blake knew he’d be done for.

“I want you,” Chris said again, leaning forward to press his forehead against Blake’s, noses nuzzling against each other, lips barely touching as they shared the air between them. He took in a deep breath; he could feel Blake tighten all around him, and goddamn, it felt amazing, and he couldn’t help imagine how unbelievable it would be to have all of him inside Blake, like he had been inside Chris not too long ago. He didn’t know if this was the best time to say what he was about to reveal, but it didn’t matter, so long as he meant it… “I love you.”

Blake barely had any time to react to Chris’s whispers; he was gone in seconds, eyes clenched tight, hands balled into fists at his side, banging restlessly against the wall behind him as he came. He hadn’t even thought about staying quiet or the mess the two men were getting into in a busy L.A. nightclub; the only thing he could think about was how amazing this was, that the man who had his fingers inside him just said he loved him. That a man that loved him could make him feel this way.

It didn’t help at all that Chris was right there all around him biting and sucking at the hollow, sensitive spot where his jaw met his throat, the place that Chris had quickly learned could produce the most sensual sounds from his boyfriend’s body. Chris leaned in to press his face against Blake’s cheek, feeling the heart-racing pulse gradually slow underneath his touch. He smiled at Blake’s dazed, panting expression, the fingers still nestled deep inside feeling every shudder and shake rushing through Blake’s frame.

Blake’s eyes shot open at the startling feeling of their cheeks meeting, unkempt facial hair never feeling more erotic than right now, with Chris nuzzling at Blake’s neck, chuckling softly to himself. It hadn’t hit him until Chris slowly pulled out of him, leaving him empty and shivering, that they were in a bathroom stall at Les Deux – that Chris had just told him he loved him in a bathroom stall at Les Deux. He wrapped his arms around Chris’s broad back, feeling the ripples and muscles through a layer of cotton. Chris’s presence, their embrace, grounded him and reminded him that while they might have just fucked in a club bathroom – one of those terrible clichés Blake thought he’d never repeat – just being close to Chris made this a little bit magical.

“When we retell the story about how we said we love each other for the first time,” Blake panted, trying to catch his breath as Chris was making a failing attempt to clean up the both of them with toilet tissue. “Can we not mention that it was while you were fingerbanging me in a club bathroom stall?”

He felt a grin break out against his skin; Chris lifted his head, peering down into hazy, sated brown eyes, his own eyes dancing. “If you’re good,” he warned playfully, craning his neck down to press a peck against Blake’s lips. “Does this mean you’re saying it now, too?”

Blake returned the kiss, deepening it with a deft tongue, eager to get out of the bathroom and back out into the club as that would bring the two one step closer to getting back to their apartment. “If you’re good,” he replied with a smirk.


	6. …If He Only Wants To See You When He’s Drunk

> **Chapter Six  
>  …If He Only Wants To See You When He’s Drunk**
> 
> **_April 2007_**   
> 

Blake Lewis was never fucking drinking again.

The headache came on before he ever even opened his eyes, a dull, droning throb at his temples his wake-up call. He didn’t want to open his eyes at this point, knowing from years of experience that any form of light was going to be lethal to his growing migraine, even the soft, gray haze of light from a California morning. He couldn’t remember what day it was, but God, if he had to sing or act or do anything resembling a normal human being that day he might as well quit the competition right there.

He couldn’t remember how much he had drank last night – always a clear indication that whatever it was, it was too much – but the lingering, spotty memories of tequila shots and unending streams of beer pints gave him a good idea. While parts of the night were spotty – ohhh, Blake groaned, that is not a pleasant thought – he could remember quite clearly from the dull pain in his thighs and his ass that he and Chris has quite a bit of fun last night at the club.

“…Fuck.” Blake attempted to sit up in the bed but his throbbing head and aching joints thought otherwise. He really wished he could remember what happened when he and Chris got back home.

“You say something, babe?” called a voice from the bathroom, the smooth Virginian accent usually melodic and relaxing to Blake’s ears but this morning only made him wince. He mumbled something into the comforter, throwing an exhausted arm over his eyes. Blake needed some coffee, Blake needed a mountain of Advil…Blake needed another twelve hours of sleep to allow this hangover to wear off.

Chris apparently had other ideas for Blake.

The bathroom door opened with a cascading burst of steam, and out stepped Chris, his naked body nearly steaming itself, fresh and damp, wiping at the crevices of his ears with a towel. He was an absolute vision, the stuff bubbly co-eds and housewives alike would fantasize about, and Blake didn’t need to uncover his eyes to know what was waiting for him as he felt the creak of the bedsprings. But right now, he thought, if Chris didn’t have a horse tranquilizer of a painkiller or superhuman healing powers, he really didn’t want to strike up conversation right now.

The bed shifted under Chris’s added weight, even the slight movement sending waves of nausea licking at Blake’s throat, and he swallowed them won, desperately trying to avoid puking right in front of – or God perish the thought, on – his boyfriend. But then a warm, comforting hand ghosted over his forehead, the first sensation of the morning that wasn’t wholly unpleasant, and Blake nuzzled his head into the touch, smiling slightly at the feel of Chris’s damp fingertips on his skin.

“Good to see you’re alive, you had me worried for a little while there,” Chris joked, knowing to keep his voice down, to keep his movements slow and minimal as he sat next to Blake’s body on the bed. He smiled as Blake attempted a laugh, which turned into a nauseated groan, and his voice grew soft, losing its previous edge. “How you holding up?”

Another groan from Blake; now his boyfriend was asking him to speak and form cognitive thought, and that might not end well. “Chris,” he lifted his arm from his eyes, despite his body’s protests, so he could see the younger man peering over at him through tiny slits of honey brown. “Your boyfriend is a hot mess.”

Chris chuckled, hand idly running through Blake’s hair the same hair he pulled and dominated in that bathroom stall the night before. “Well, you’ve got the mess part right.”

“How are you functioning right now?” Blake managed out. He was pretty sure Chris had gone shot-for-shot with him at the club, yet he was acting like he hasn’t even gone out at all last night.

Leaning in to place a tender kiss on Blake’s hairline, Chris moved his hand lower, squeezing the blond’s shoulder reassuringly. “A long shower and some aspirin help a lot with that,” he replied. Blake realized for the first time that Chris was naked, the heat from his skin radiating off of him nearly through the comforter, and damn, if Blake were a little more in sound and body right now… “Plus, I’ve got like, six inches and thirty pounds on you, and I wasn’t the one who insisted on the parting Jaegerbomb as we left.”

Blake cringed; he had forgotten about the Jaegerbomb.

Opening his mouth wide as he took a deep yawn, Blake observed the slightly sour look on Chris’s face as the younger man looked away from him; Blake gave him a confused look until he recognized the own rancidness coming from his mouth, and scrunched his nose up in displeasure. “My mouth tastes like a hobo spit in it,” he said, and grew nervous when he looked over at Chris, who was not smiling from the joke. “Oh God…a hobo didn’t really spit in my mouth, right?”

Chris’s arm drifted down Blake’s side, affectionately rubbing up and down the older man’s leg through the blanket. “You had a bit of a rough night when we got ho me,” Chris finally divulged and Blake sank back down on the bed, wishing the mattress could swallow him down so he could disappear from Chris’s view. He knew exactly how bad he could be if he’d had a few too many. “We got back and you were babbling a bit…something about a banana and some K-Y…” He shot Blake a smirk, and the blond could only blush in response. It was very out of the ordinary for Chris to be the one with the mischievous smirk and Blake to be the one blushing demurely. “And you started puking, but by that time I had gotten you into the bathroom. No hobos, though.”

It was then that Blake’s heart sank; he hadn’t remembered a lick of what happened last night when they got home, and now as Chris was piecing it back together for him he regretted it all. “Oh God,” he muttered, covering his remorseful face with a heavy hand. “I’m so sorry, Chris.”

But Chris waved a hand at Blake, dismissing his worry. “Nah, it was nothing,” he said, though Blake still looked upon him with large, apologetic eyes. “I just made sure you got into bed, safe and clean, made sure you didn’t choke on your own puke and die or anything.” Chris gave a chuckle as Blake frowned; he had done more than Blake expected. “Didn’t want anyone to think I was scheming to do away with my competition, though it probably wouldn’t have been a bad idea, come to think of it.”

“You took care of me,” Blake observed, his voice sounding small. Chris thought it was just from weariness, his voice strained only because of the groaning and purging he had done the night before.

Another shrug of his shoulders; another inch of blanket Blake tried to hide under. “Of course I did.” Chris said it without hesitation, without any uncertainty in his eyes. Sure, he could have listed a dozen things out of his head he would have preferred doing than holding Blake’s head up as he emptied himself into the toilet, and watching him as he slept, restless so that nothing happened to him. But it wasn’t like he would have just left him there, not even after what Blake unsuccessfully assumed about their relationship at the club. Not especially after what Chris had said to him at the club.

Reaching over to the tiny expanse of forehead and blond hair that wasn’t hiding under the comforter, Chris gave Blake one parting caress to his skin, fingers quickly grazing over the hairline. “I’ll go get you some aspirin,” he said, rising from the bed with a squeak, scanning the floor for a semi-clean pair of boxers. “How about some coffee? I think Phil put up a pot.”

Nodding and giving a soft groan in response, Blake closed his eyes, trying to imprint the feeling of Chris’s touch deep into his notoriously spotty memory. He heard the door to their bedroom shut behind Chris, and immediately his mind drifted to thoughts of silent, dawning realization. This definitely hadn’t been the first time Blake had gotten sick during a night of heavy partying, but most of those instances were with Ethan and his friends back in Seattle, where the term “puke and rally” was a badge of honor. Blake had never found himself safely curled in bed, clean and warm, with a man who just told him he loved him bringing him coffee and painkillers while half-naked. He could honestly say that he had never woken up to Ethan or Cisco doing that.

But that very thought – that Chris had taken care of him last night, above and beyond making sure he didn’t die in his sleep – that was what Blake found so difficult to wrap his mind around and understand. Despite Chris’s nearly symptom-free hangover this morning, Blake was sure the younger man had gotten smashed along with him last night, and probably had no initial interest in caring for his boyfriend as they got home. And yet, he did – and still was. Blake’s breath caught in his throat, suddenly awash with emotion.

There were a lot of people that come and go in one’s life that are by your side when the drinks are flowing and joy is abound but disappear when the consequential morning arrives. But in Blake’s life, there was Chris…who was still there.

The door opened again, and Chris entered with a warm smile, only the redness in his eyes giving away his hangover. A steamy cup of coffee was gripped by the handle in one hand, the other palming two red capsules he had snatched from Sligh’s old migraine stash he had left in the kitchen accidentally. He couldn’t have been more utterly domestic had he put an apron on, Blake thought, but at this moment, after the truth was becoming clear to him, he didn’t wan to ruin this with a comparison to Martha Stewart.

“Four sugars, right?” Chris was still looking down, paying attention to the mug of hot liquid in his hand and not the serene half-smile on his boyfriend’s face. “I didn’t know if you wanted the half-and-half or not, y’know, since dairy is probably not a good idea for you right now –“

“I love you.” The words came so easily to Blake, rolling off his tongue and stopping Chris in his tracks, the younger man stopping so suddenly he upset the coffee in his hand, some of the liquid splashing up and out of the mug, probably leaving a stain in the carpet.

Chris blinked, paused for a beat, trying to mentally process the earnest look in Blake’s bloodshot eyes. “So…no half-and-half, then?”

Blake sat up, ignoring the comment and the protests of his weary body, and locked his eyes with Chris’s, finally seeing the emotions he held for the man as if it were the first time. “Fuck the coffee, Chris,” he said, watching Chris walk over to the nightstand and place the mug down carefully, noticing how Chris’s fingers trembled ever since he had said those words. “This isn’t about the coffee. Well, it is, but – it’s so much more than that.”

With a confused frown etching into his features, Chris held open his other hand, holding out the two capsules. “There’s Excedrin, too,” he managed, not quite sure of what Blake was getting at.

“Chris,” Blake breathed, reaching up to grab hold of the younger man’s hand, thumb running against knuckles, to pull him down onto the bed gently. “It’s the coffee, it’s the pills…it’s everything. It’s the fact that you didn’t just leave me in a puddle of my own puke on the bathroom floor.”

“Jesus, B, other people have to use that bathroom too, you know.”

Blake tried to ignore Chris’s jokes, his attempts to diffuse the situation with humor – something Blake was usually guilty of far more than Chris, and so the older man knew exactly how to circumvent it. “You took care of me when you really didn’t have to,” he continued, his voice, soft and sincere. “When you really didn’t want to.” Chris opened his mouth to protest, eyes wide and glittering, trained on Blake’s face, but Blake held up a hand to cut him off; he didn’t want to hear any humble excuses from him, not now.

“You were there for me last night…you’re still here. And that means so much to me…” He took a deep breath, organizing his thoughts as he felt them jumble around his head like a turntable. He closed his eyes, feeling the soft burn of Chris’s stare on him, intense and wanting and simply waiting for the words to come. And when he opened them again his mind was clear, intent, and all that filled his vision were the sparkling plains of green he was slowly learning he couldn’t live without. “I love you.”

The statement was simple and hushed, Blake’s tongue wrapping around each syllable, his heart that much more behind those words than the night before. Chris was nearly speechless as he felt his eyes well with wetness despite himself; this meant more, so much more than what was said last night under the slight haze of alcohol, among the din and chaos of a busy club. Here, there was nothing to misinterpret, there were no airs to keep or partygoers to judge.

Leaning in slowly, Chris wrapped his arms around Blake’s frame, the warmth of their bodies mingling together over the cotton sheets. “I love you too,” he whispered, craning his neck to place a soft kiss against Blake’s temple. He felt Blake’s head shift underneath his lips, dying for a kiss, for that connection; but Chris could only smile smugly, teeth bared and eyes dancing as he swiped a thumb over Blake’s waiting mouth. “But I’m seriously not kissing you until you brush your teeth.”


	7. …If He Doesn’t Want To Marry You

> **Chapter Seven  
>  …If He Doesn’t Want To Marry You**
> 
> **_April 2007_**   
> 

Chris was only half paying attention to the conversation at hand, the dwindling group of idols chatting genially as they awaited the call for rehearsal, but the half that was paying attention was sitting on edge. Somehow a heated discussion on pickles had given way to a conversation about Phil’s impromptu wedding to Kendra so many years ago. If they were having this conversation a year ago, Chris would have happily joined in, holding his ex-girlfriend’s hand as they talked about floral arrangements for the distant future. But the mere fact that he was sitting there with the others reminded him that this wasn’t last year, that it wasn’t Gayle that he was in love with. That his world was so much more complicated now than just floral arrangements.

“…so it was really small,” Phil continued, one arm slung over the couch casually, as Melinda and Jordin listened with rapt attention. Chris would never understand why tales of someone else’s wedding were always so appealing to women. “And really short notice. Kendra wore her mother’s dress –” at this Jordin and Melinda exchanged sympathetic cooing sounds, and Chris and Blake exchanged two pairs of rolling eyes. “- and it was only about twenty or so people there. Just family, friends – and I think half the guests were spending more time checking to see if they saw a baby bump on her instead of actually paying attention to the ceremony.”

“That small?” Jordin said with a little bit of longing in her voice.

Phil nodded a hint of a smile on his face; even if he hadn’t gotten to know the older man so well over the past few months, Chris could tell that this was a man who absolutely loved to talk about anything having to do with his wife and family. One could always tell when Phil was on the phone with Kendra, as his eyes would soften and an uncontrollable grin would spread across his face. That they were still so in love after all these years of marriage was a real testament to the kind of people the Staceys truly were. “She wanted it intimate, and I wanted it as soon as possible,” he replied with a chuckle. “It turned out perfectly.”

“That’s exactly what I want: something intimate.” Melinda clasped her hands together, a faraway look in her eyes, and Chris inwardly groaned, knowing this was going to take a while. “Just my friends and family – my pastor, of course – at my little church back at home. At this point I’d rather save my money for something bigger, more important than a wedding. Why spend so much money and effort on making memories that one day, when you’ll have an entire lifetime to make them?”

Chris saw Phil nod knowingly; although only half of the reasoning behind Phil’s wedding was haste, the other half was that he and Kendra had hardly enough savings for the tin cans strung behind his car. Blake made a small noise in his throat at he leaned over towards the coffee table to pick up the bowl of popcorn Melinda had made earlier, popping a kernel in his mouth and resting the bowl on his stomach as he reclined. Melinda smiled at the blond, though Chris wasn’t sure if the noise his boyfriend had made was agreement with the older woman, or if he had been listening to conversation at all. Chris decided to let sleeping dogs lie, as Jordin perked up in her seat on the armchair, her interests piqued.

“Why would anyone want a small wedding?!” she asked in indignation, shocked to find that for once she disagreed with her best friend on an issue. “That’s like, the most important day of your lives! I want everyone in the world to know I’m getting married. Money won’t be any object,” she waved her hands, gesturing wildly, images of canopies and lace-embroidered accents filling her imagination.

“It’s not a Sweet 16, Speezy,” Blake interjected, shoving a handful of popcorn into his mouth. Chris was taken aback that the older man was paying attention to the conversation, especially since Jordin was well on her way to describing more of a royal coronation than a wedding and Chris himself was wishing for a quick excuse to tune her out.

Jordin looked affronted by Blake’s callous remark, and Chris thought Blake was probably lucky there wasn’t anything sharp around for Jordin to throw at him. A pillow from the couch had to suffice, the teenager aiming impeccably at his head. “It would be way better than a Sweet 16!” She defended. “It would be beautiful, and romantic…roses absolutely everywhere. And organ music. And a string quartet.” Jordin ticked off her requirements on her fingers, her eyes rising towards the ceiling in thought. “And my bridesmaids would all wear pink.”

Chris felt a light tap on his side – he turned, trying not to look to disinterested in Jordin as he didn’t also wish to face her wrath, and met mischievous golden brown eyes half-concealed by the floppy, hideous gray hat Blake refused to part with. His boyfriend was tapping out a soft beat against Chris’s ribs with sock-sheathed toes, the hint of a smile edging into his features. Chris couldn’t help but brighten up with he looked upon Blake’s face, warmth and emotion swimming through his body, knowing that, despite his future being quite different now from what he imagined a year ago, he wouldn’t have it any other way.

Another loud cluck of a tongue broke the long string of wedding requests Jordin was making, that seemed like it was only going to end with skywriting in netspeak. Melinda was possibly the only person in the room who could seamlessly change the subject on her best friend. “So, Blake,” she turned the tables on the beatboxer; she hadn’t forgotten he had completely monopolized her bowl of popcorn. “What would you want your wedding to be like? Small or big?”

She only realized what she had said after it had come out of her mouth; her eyes widened and her lips sealed, but it was too late, the question was out in the open, zeroing in on its target. Chris swallowed the lump in his throat, glancing over at Blake, hoping that Melinda wasn’t setting a precedent of getting everyone in the room to describe their dream wedding. Not only was it a completely unacceptable topic for guys to ever think about, much less discuss over popcorn, but it was something he didn’t want to put in his mind at this point. There was so much left to figure out in his life, so much of his future that was now uncertain. There was no need to add a wedding that may never happen to his mind.

Blake looked startled for a moment, the bowl of popcorn resting on his reclining frame not even stirring from its position, and in a second his answer came pouring from his mouth, a free flow of thoughts that appeared to Chris as effortless as his beatboxing. “Well, obviously it’d have to be small,” he said, scratching at his ear nonchalantly. “It could be at home, but for it to be completely legal I’d have to go East, like Massachusetts or something, I guess. Would break my mother’s heart not to have it on the West Coast, but she’d get over it eventually. Could have it in Canada, they’re all gung-ho about that shit, but my dad would rather disown me than have me married in Vancouver.”

He chuckled, seeming to be at ease with the controversial issue, never minding the fact that Phil was nervously tapping his feet when it wasn’t even his nervous habit to do so, and Melinda’s sculpted eyebrows were raised so high they seemed ready to crawl up into her hairline. “Plus then none of my cousins would probably show up. I love them and all, but that’s like 90 less Chicken Francaises I’ll have to order, that’s all I’m saying.” His hand dug into the bowl and pulled out a fistful of kernels, finally giving up claim to the bowl and passing it over to Jordin.

Popping a few more into his mouth, Blake continued, oblivious to the silently nervous expression on his boyfriend’s face. Chris didn’t want the conversation turning to him, didn’t want to be forced to admit his perception of his own identity was changing so kindly forgive him if he didn’t have a china pattern picked out. “Of course, if it’s on the East Coast then more of your family can come.” Chris felt another poke from Blake’s toe in his side as the older man spoke matter-of-factly. “And to be perfectly honest, I’d probably prefer seeing more Richardsons in the audience than Lewises, my family can get downright impossible with an open bar.”

Blake laughed to himself, shaking his head slightly as he emptied the contents of his hand into his mouth, wiping the excess grease and crumbs onto his t-shirt. The entire rest of the room was silent: Phil’s eyes bugged out of his head, Jordin’s mouth hung so open she could catch flies. But no one was more surprised than the young man on the other side of the loveseat, his body and mind in complete shock he could hardly breathe. He was pretty sure…no, he was definitely sure, confirmed by the reactions of the other three in the room, that Blake had just said…that he had unflinchingly included Chris in his envisioned wedding plans, and most certainly not as a best man. Blake had considered Chris’s family…had considered him.

And strangely enough to Chris this didn’t scare him at all.

Finally noticing four pairs of eyes in the room trained upon him, Blake raised his head, looking around at the others with a quizzical look on his face. “What?” he asked innocently, his gaze flitting from face to face in the room, finally resting on Chris, his brows curving together upon his forehead with confusion. “What, do I have popcorn in my teeth?” Blake picked at his teeth crudely with a shortened fingernail, wondering why the mood had suddenly grown tense and silent and everyone was staring at him. Perhaps his fly was open or something…

But Blake didn’t have much time to ponder as Chris nearly lunged from his seat, grasping Blake’s head between two strong hands and kissed him passionately, the act completely spontaneous and utterly surprising to Blake. A small startled gasp rose in his throat as Chris pressed his lips against his, but it soon melted into a soft groan as Blake responded to the kiss, tilting his head ever so slightly for a better angle against Chris’s crushing lips. He had absolutely no idea what had gotten into his boyfriend, but as he closed his eyes and tried to deepen the kiss, never minding the others in the room, he didn’t really care.

Phil’s eyes could not possibly get any larger as he was stock still on the couch, the shock of Chris’s sudden movements the only thing keeping him from excusing himself and making a hasty and embarrassed exit. Melinda looked away for modesty, a mumbled “oh, Lord” on her breath that she deftly covered with a cough. Jordin was not nearly as polite, letting out a low whistle at the two lovers. The realization suddenly dawned on all of them: Blake made the unexpected admission that he wanted to marry Chris – or at the least didn’t think about such a union without thinking about the other man – and Chris had reacted to that just as unexpectedly.

Drifting slowly apart, Chris watched Blake’s face as he left him wanting, the need he always felt for the man evident in his closed expression. He didn’t smile, didn’t grin or laugh, but then Blake opened his eyes he saw more happiness in Chris’s face than he had ever seen, a soft, silent joy smoldering just beneath the surface. Blake still didn’t understand what had set him off like that or why he was the cause of it all, but he certainly wasn’t going to complain.

The room was silent for a few moments, everyone either too enamored or embarrassed to speak. Chris’s stare was so intense upon Blake, Blake’s mind not even registering the thought to look away. Finally it was Jordin who broke the silence, the tension that could have lasted all morning without end.

“And I’ve got to have a horse drawn carriage!” she exclaimed, shoving her finger in the air excitedly.


	8. …If He’s Breaking Up With You

> **Chapter Eight  
>  …If He’s Breaking Up With You**
> 
> **_April 2007_**   
> 

The first time Blake broke up with Chris that day, it was at breakfast, and he had mumbled it into his cereal as Chris eased down into his seat, a mug of coffee in one hand and a plate of toast in the other. Chris almost didn’t notice the first time Blake had said it, so he innocently asked him to speak up over his Cocoa Krispies.

“I’m breaking up with you,” he repeated, which caused Jordin to squeak in surprise and almost made Sanjaya choke on his banana.

But Chris didn’t fold at his boyfriend’s statement; he didn’t curse, or cry, or overturn the kitchen table like Blake had originally expected. In fact, Chris didn’t even seem to listen to Blake, the tell-tale signs of recognition completely absent from his face.

The entire table sat in tense silence as all eyes were on Chris, waiting for an answer, a reaction, Blake perhaps the most anxious of all. When he finally spoke he kept his eyes down at his toast, his voice deceivingly even. “No, you’re not,” he answered breezily; Jordin gasped again, and this time even Lakisha was deeply interested in what would happen next between the two. “You can’t break up with me until I’ve had my coffee. You know I’m not able to make serious decisions or even think coherently before my morning coffee.”

Chris took an intimidating large bite out of his toast, marking the end to the conversation, and striking everyone else in the room speechless. Blake thought about it for a moment and conceded. Chris was near impossible before his first mug of coffee or an early morning fuck, and so far that day he had neither. So he allowed Chris to take his breakfast leisurely, not bringing up the topic for the entire duration, and when he finally did finish, the topic had degenerated into a debate about maple syrup, and the discussion was temporarily shelved.

\------------------------------

**“We R brking up, sry :(“.**

The second time Blake broke up with Chris that day was over a text message, a short abbreviated comment buzzing in Chris’s pocket when Blake had been ushered off to makeup. The message burned bright on the screen of his phone, and it caused Chris to frown and run an exhausted hand over a close-shaven head. He found it particularly interesting that the older man thought the sad little emoticon at the end of the statement made up for the truncated frankness of the text – or that he preferred to send the second breakup notice of the day five minutes after they had actually been in the same room together, joking and acting as if nothing was wrong.

With a heavy sigh, Chris typed in his own response and sent it back to Blake, who received the text with a puzzled expression, not expecting such a speedy answer.

**“Can’t break up with me in a text. Against the rules, B.”**

“That’s right, you know,” the makeup assistant quipped, inconspicuously reading over Blake’s shoulder. “Breaking up over a text, that breaks relationship code. You weren’t really trying to do that, were you?”

Blake didn’t answer, grumbling instead about not having any privacy even when putting on eyeliner, and even that he keeps under his breath lest she hear and he ends up with a little too much blush for comfort. He had planned to send another message to Chris, stressing his serious statement from before, but he instead folded up his Sidekick and sat in silence for the rest of his time in the chair.

\------------------------------

Chris was in the shower the third time Blake broke up with him that day, washing away the heavy stage makeup and the stresses of the day. He didn’t hear the door open as he ducked his head underneath the pulsing hot stream of water, but just as tangible as the water he felt Blake’s presence in the bathroom on the other side of the curtain.

“If you’re taking a piss,” Chris called out over the sound of the falling water; it was unusual for Blake to come into the bathroom while Chris was there and vice versa, but it wasn’t unpleasant. “Don’t flush, or I’ll kill you.”

But Blake wasn’t there for that reason, and he didn’t even need to speak for both men to realize what his intentions were. Sitting down on the closed seat of the toilet, Blake took in a deep breath, one that Chris could hear even over the din of the shower. The tension rose in the room and Blake was thankful for the opaque shower curtain between them, thin as it was, so that he didn’t have to see Chris’s face or watch the water wash over his naked frame. It would have made it harder for him to do what he had to…

“I have to break up with you.”

He certainly wasn’t expecting to hear a chuckle from behind the shower curtain. Chris’s voice was filtered through the sounds of the shower and Blake’s own heart beating in his ears, but even so he doubted the younger man’s voice held any tension or anger in his response. “You can’t break up with me now, Blake.” His voice was so level and unaffected it was unhinging Blake; Chris was so cool about this he didn’t know what to think. “You’re fully clothed, and if you didn’t notice, I’m not.”

Blake opened his mouth, a sharp retort about stating the obvious hot on his lips, but he kept silent, hands kneading against the fabric on his thighs, the steam from the shower already fogging up his glasses and causing his shirt to stick to the skin like an extra layer of himself. Chris continued, the bar of soap in his hand resting in a pool of lather above his heart. “I’m in a higher state of vulnerability right now; terrible position for me to defend myself at all.

“Either you level the playing field,” Chris suggested from behind the curtain, “And try again, or you’ll just have to give up, ‘cause you can’t break up with me like this.”

It took a moment for Blake to think about this invitation, but a moment was all it took, and in a flash he was stripping off his shirt and pants, flinging his glasses off to God knows where. He slipped into the shower stall behind the curtain, the sight of a solid, naked frame flooding his blurry view, and so Blake didn’t break up with Chris this time, either.

\------------------------------

The fourth time, Chris broke up with Blake.

He slid in next to his boyfriend underneath the sheets, cool and dry everywhere except for the patch of heat on the bed spreading from Blake’s naked body. He didn’t embrace him right away, the way he usually did – the way he was quickly realizing was the only way he found a good night’s sleep. But he kept his distance in the bed, far enough almost not to feel the heat of Blake’s body, and cupped his boyfriend’s face in his hand, their eyes locking in the darkness of the room.

“If you really want to break up,” his voice sounded hoarse, like the words were so foreign to his lips. “We can. I won’t fight it.”

The response he received was a ragged sign, prickly stubble nuzzling against his palm, and a shifting of Blake’s body to embrace him, wrapping arms around his waist and up his spine, legs quickly entangling as if that was the position they were always intended for. The smaller man folded into Chris’s touch, feeling security and warmth in the other’s embrace, and rested his head in the crook of Chris’s neck, lips brushing against the other man’s throat but merely touching the skin there, not kissing or even moving.

Holding his boyfriend close in his arms, Chris let his eyes drift closed, no longer needing to see Blake to feel his presence. “This is your pre-emptive insecure relationship stuff again, right?” he said into Blake’s hair, his voice muffled by the downy softness of it but still heard clearly by Blake. He merely sniffled as an answer, but Chris wasn’t really asking for one so much as telling Blake that he knew, notifying him that he realized what he was doing. “Break up with me before we drag it out and drift apart.” He placed a soft kiss against Blake’s hairline; the words really did sound larger, scarier, when you said them aloud, like whispering Bloody Mary into a mirror for the first time. And Blake had these words swimming through his head all day, possibly even all week.

“This won’t last forever,” Blake whispered against Chris’s flesh, his hot breath dancing against Chris’s neck, the sensation running down his spine. Chris couldn’t tell if Blake was referring to the ever-impending end to this competition, the possibility that either of them may be eliminated at any time; or if he meant their relationship, their love. The truth was, Blake wasn’t even sure himself.

“It will if we let it,” Chris said simply. He had gotten the advice from a man wise in keeping a relationship fresh and true, that making things unnecessarily complicated never got anyone anywhere they wished to be.

Blake started rambling about the end of the competition, what would happen once one of them had been eliminated. About how he calculated the distance between Seattle and Virginia and the sheer weight of that number could cause him to choke up in tears. Chris held him through all this, silent and eager to listen as Blake let out all of it, all the troubles crowding his mind and pushing him to end the relationship before it got too serious. Before they were both past the point of no return.

He let out a heavy sigh that Chris could feel course through his body. “But I think we’re both past that point right now.”

Chris chuckled, tracing Blake’s spine playfully with his fingers, causing the other man to squirm and laugh softly; Chris already knew the exact places Blake was most ticklish. “Oh, I’m way past the point of no return,” he said. “I was gone the minute I realized I was falling for a bouncy, beatboxing midget.”

A sharp poke in his own ribs, and Blake was grinning, a flash of mischief in his eyes. “How do you think I feel?” Blake joked, tilting his head to look up at his boyfriend, falling deep into eyes of green. “Falling for a Southern-fried, Abercromie and Fitch-wearing, country-listening, card-carrying jock.” He craned his neck to place a kiss against Chris’s jawline, the short, prickly hairs there grazing against his lips. “My jock.”

“I do not wear Abercromie and Fitch, thank you.” Chris pressed a kiss against Blake’s forehead, then tilted his head down to capture the other man’s lips. It never felt so perfect, so right to kiss another human being as it was to kiss Blake, how their mouths fit perfectly together and Blake knew exactly how much tongue slipped into Chris’s mouth was appropriate for the situation. He cradled Blake’s head in his hand, thumb grazing against stubble.

They didn’t so much break apart from their kiss as simply end it, their mouths still brushing together, lips touching, neither man having the energy or the will to move apart. “So I guess we’re not breaking up then?” There was still a tinge of fear in Chris’s voice, like one moment soon Blake would jump up from the bed and quickly change his mind that he was in love with him. The thought alone scared Chris more than he ever thought possible.

But Blake didn’t move away: he smiled against Chris’s lips, eyes drifting shut as weariness overtook him. Trying to break up with Chris Richardson, apparently, proved to be a tiring and futile task. “I love you,” he murmured, right before sleep overpowered them both, coming to rest after a long day entangled in each other’s embrace.


	9. …If He Disappears On You

> **Chapter Nine  
>  …If He Disappears On You**
> 
> **_April 2007_**   
> 

Chris was searching behind the door and underneath the coffee table when Lakisha walked in, and instantly her eyebrows cocked inquisitively, the younger man’s actions very unusual for him. “Lose something, hun?” she asked, walking tentatively into the room and giving the man a wide berth for his search.

“Yeah,” Chris gave a heavy, frustrated sigh, and Lakisha mused that she had never seen the man so on edge. “My boyfriend.” He overturned one of the couch cushions in the shared living room, and Lakisha bit back the comment on her lips – that Chris had completely lost it.

She instead clucked her tongue disapprovingly, hand on her hip, as she watched Chris once again check behind the door, as if Blake had snuck in behind her shadow in a strange extended game of hide and seek. “Baby, I don’t think he’s in the couch cushions,” she said very carefully, eyeing Chris as he paced around the room anxiously.

“Well, I’ve looked fucking everywhere else –“ Chris immediately mumbled an apology for the slipped curse before Lakisha could voice her routine protest – “And I can’t…I don’t…” He ran a hand over his closely-shaven head, garbled words and thoughts bouncing around inside of it without any direction or hope of clarity. Pausing for a moment, he looked around the overturned room, pledging to himself to clean it up once he found Blake…or, perhaps, make Blake clean it up after all this trouble. “It’s like he just…disappeared or something.”

Frowning in sympathy, Lakisha approached the young man, placing a hand upon his shoulder. “He’s got to be around somewhere,” she said consolingly, seeing the slight tinge of panic flashing in Chris’s eyes. “The boy’s small, but he’s not that easy to miss.”

“That’s just the thing.” Now Lakisha could actually feel the tension in Chris’s body, his spine rigid, his hands clenching and unclenching nervously at his sides. “He told me to meet him here…he shouldn’t be anywhere else. He just…” he cut himself off again, full of nerves over his MIA boyfriend. Even for those two lovebirds, Lakisha thought, it was a bit alarming. “You haven’t seen him at all, have you?”

Lakisha had to shrug her shoulders, causing Chris’s heart to sink even farther. “Can’t say I have,” she replied with a shake of her head. “Maybe he’s just gone –“

Right as the words left her lips Lakisha realized these were the wrong words to use. Chris’s entire body seemed to seize up as he visibly winced, his eyes closing in a painful shirk away from Lakisha’s reassuring hand. The older woman had known that face well by now; it had only been a day since the news – the terrible news no one ever wants to hear, the kind of news that would have pushed her to her knees had it happened in Detroit or Lansing – but that pained face of Chris’s was ingrained into her memory

“Oh, Jesus,” she instantly recanted, as the tell-tale quivering of Chris’s lips began, his large body almost comically attempting to fold in on itself, away from her. “I am the most insensitive person…Chris…” She held her hand over her chest, remorseful for using the word “gone” so flippantly, hoping that Chris didn’t storm out of the room or break down in tears, because she knew only the man who had disappeared could handle Chris in either situation.

Chris waved away Lakisha’s apology; it wasn’t important if she said she was sorry about making the off-hand remark, the point was that it was out there now, out roaming the living room and inside his head, taking up residence. Less than a day ago – twenty hours and nineteen minutes and yes Chris had been counting – they had all heard about what had happened in Virginia, his home state, hours away from Chesapeake but so raw it felt like it happened in his fucking home. And ever since then Chris had been walking on a tightrope, blindly going on, following on a string and trying desperately not to remember that there was no longer ground underneath him. Blake hadn’t been there when they heard the news; when he finally did arrive, when Melinda had taken him over to the side out of Chris’s earshot but pointing in his direction a whole lot, Blake avoided the topic altogether, changing the subject to sandwiches or remaining oddly silent. It wasn’t very comforting to know that your boyfriend wanted nothing to do with comforting you.

But it was more than just missing the casual comfort of Blake’s presence; it was what Lakisha had inadvertently brought up, it was the words _gone_ and _lost_ and the thought that he still hadn’t heard back on a few acquaintances from Blacksburg. It was the fact that the producers wouldn’t even let him fucking flip on CNN for five minutes, citing a breach of one of the myriad of clauses in a contract he was already breaking. It was that Chris felt detached from everything, from the other contestants he considered friends. It was the fact that Blake was gone from him emotionally, it seemed, and now apparently he was gone physically as well.

He tried to dismiss the comment with an “It’s nothing,” tried to wipe away the pain with a toothy smile. But the moment the words attempted to pass his lips he faltered, felt the wetness behind his eyes and soon it took all his resolve just to keep from bawling. It was one thing to stay by your boyfriend’s side when forecasts are sunny and there’s not a cloud of troubles in sight…and quite another to stick by him with words of comfort when he really needed to feel loved.

Lakisha sighed, shaking her head as she wrapped the young man in a motherly hug. “I know this time is hard for you, sweetie,” she said soothingly, though she could feel the tension in Chris’s shoulders, and she knew words coming from anyone but Blake at this point were no consolation. “But you…you’re going to get through it. You’re strong, I know you will. And Blake…Blake just needed some time. You both do.”

The smile plastered on Chris’s face turned sour. “Well, he could have picked a better time for it, that’s for sure.” Wriggling out of Lakisha’s arms, Chris moved to get out of the room and find some air; he thought he had found something golden with Blake, something true. But Chris needed him, really needed to talk and cry and just be with him and Blake was nowhere to be found…

“Now hold on just a second.” Lakisha’s voice was forceful and kept Chris’s hand off the doorknob; her eyes flicked over to the clock on the wall, then rolled back to the ceiling, looking far past it. “I wasn’t supposed to tell you this, but you’ve got one foot out the door already and the other one’s about to kick that man to the curb…” Chris listened with the deeper interest as Lakisha rested a hand on her hip, shaking her head slightly. These two were absolutely hopeless without a little help. “He’s in our bathroom…he’s waiting for you.”

Confused as to why his boyfriend would be in the bathroom leading to the girls’ apartment and not their own, Chris furrowed his brow, about to ask the question, but Lakisha cut him off. “He wanted whatever he’s planning to be a surprise,” she said, and interrupted yet again with a well-manicured hand as Chris tried once again to ask a question. “And no, I don’t know what he’s planning, I think my responsibility to keep you occupied does not extend to knowing what you two are going to be doing in a bathroom together.”

This didn’t ease Chris’s confusion in the least; well, at least he knew Blake hadn’t booked it to Mexico on a whim. “But…I don’t…why…”

Lakisha simply gave a knowing smile and a wink, picking up the unmistakable curve of a smile at the corner of Chris’s lips. “He hasn’t really disappeared on you, child…he’s just hidden from you. For a time.” Her glance moved back up to the clock on the wall. “And he said he’d be done in a little while setting up, but I don’t think he’d mind if you stopped by early.”

The anxiety and sadness that had taken over Chris’s bright demeanor was pushed away by desire, the urgent need to see Blake again. He quickly went back over to Lakisha and pulled her into a tight hug, whispering a mumbled “thank you” into her shoulder.

Returning the embrace with soft, reassuring pats of fingers against Chris’s back, Lakisha smiled, feeling the tension inside Chris melt away from before. “You’re going to get through this, sweetheart,” she said, as Chris broke away from her and out the door towards the girls’ apartment, almost at a dead run. “You both will.”

Chris seemed to make the meandering path from the shared living room to the girls’ apartment in record time, quickly finding the place empty and making a beeline for the bathroom. It looked like Blake had gotten to the others in the apartment as well, and he couldn’t help but smile with anxious energy as he reached the door, opening it wide with a slow creak.

A dimly-lit bathroom greeted his vision, softer and more spacious than the guys’ counterpart and the one place he wouldn’t have thought to look for his boyfriend. The bathtub was filled with warm, soapy water, its surface untouched and slightly steamy from its own heat. The harsh fluorescent lights on the ceiling and above the medicine cabinet were off, replaced by the soft glow of a half-dozen candles scattered along the rim of the tub and across the sink vanity. And in the middle of it, bunched over the foot of the tub with a match, lighting the last remaining candle, was Blake, his movements slow and tentative, a smile playing on his lips like nothing Chris had ever seen before.

A soft gasp escaped Chris’s lips before he could hold his tongue, and immediately his eyes welled with tears. Blake had done this all…all for him.

Startled by the creaking of the door and the now very familiar sound of his lover’s breath, Blake raised himself up to a standing position, his golden brown eyes dancing, the smirk never faltering. “Kiki wasn’t supposed to tell you for another five minutes,” he stated simply; his stomach had been in knots all day, hoping that this gesture would make up for his poor excuse for boyfriend behavior, but by the look on Chris’s face he could tell that it made up for it and so much more.

Chris was completely speechless, his eyes darting around the room as Blake approached him, trying to take all of it in at once. Almost instinctively, his arms went around the older man’s back as Blake wrapped his arms around Chris’s waist, enjoying his boyfriend’s reaction more and more by the moment. “Blake…” Chris managed, eyes wide, dumbfounded. “How…why…”

“I’ve been an asshole,” Blake admitted, in that blunt, unshielded way he did whenever possible, when he felt comfortable to let go. “I’ve been unavailable, I ran away from talking to you…the truth is, I’ve never dealt with this before, ever.” Blake’s smile faded, a frown sneaking into the creases of his mouth, but Chris leaned down and kissed the frown away, a soft peck on Blake’s lips that silently urged him to continue. “The way you were hurting…how you are hurting…I’d never be able to understand it. And everything that I thought about saying sounded stupid, or shallow, and I –“ he paused, trying to once again find the words, but being here in Chris’s arms made it a bit easier. “I just didn’t want to fuck anything up, Rich.”

Scanning the scene before him, hugging the other man tighter in his arms, Chris fought to hold back tears. “This,” he said, his voice barely above a whisper. “Is so not fucking up, babe.” He pulled Blake in again for a kiss, deeper this time, running his tongue along the crease of Blake’s lips as he guided him into the bathroom, shutting the door behind them.

Blake sighed into the kiss, his eyes drifting shut as he opened his mouth for Chris, feeling his tongue snake inside and simply taste him. He wanted to just let go, he wanted to wrap his legs around his boyfriend and prop himself up on the bathroom sink and let Chris fuck him silly. But then he wouldn’t get done what he originally planned, and that would just be a perfectly good bath wasted. “Hey,” he interjected, breaking the kiss. “This is about you, remember…”

He motioned towards the bathtub, and although Chris couldn’t bring himself to remove his hand from the nape of Blake’s neck, idly playing with the hair growing far too long there, he could tear his eyes away from the other man long enough to look at the inviting bath. “Can it be about _us_?” he asked, his eyes shining with mischief and growing lust.

Laughing softly, Blake craned his neck up to place a heated kiss against the pulse beating at Chris’s throat. “I did this for you,” he murmured into Chris’s skin, fingers trailing down the other man’s spine tantalizingly. “You need to de-stress…you need to let go. Plus, this way I get to watch you strip for me.” The traveling hands went lower to grab roughly at Chris’s ass, and oh, there was that unashamed grin Chris fell so hard for.

Realizing that any further argument would be fruitless, Chris conceded to his boyfriend with a shrug, disentangling himself from the other to pull his t-shirt up over his head. As the shirt fell to the floor Chris was more than aware of Blake’s hungry eyes upon him, watching every move and strain of his muscles with a lustful stare. With anyone else in his life Chris got embarrassed when they looked at his body, feeling judged or evaluated, always vulnerable. But when it came to Blake…Blake emboldened him, made his gut kick up with an actual desire to shed his clothes in the steamy bathroom as his lover watched. And as he stripped off his jeans and boxer briefs in one motion, standing there completely nude and half-hard in front of a fully-clothed Blake – well, God, he felt downright cocky.

“Jesus, Rich,” Blake was already breathing heavy, hand roaming over his belly restlessly as he couldn’t touch Chris’s body right now as freely. Chris smirked to himself as he dipped a toe into the tub, the heat startling yet soothing. “You know, you’d think I’d have gotten used to seeing you naked by now. But every single time…” Blake licked his lips lewdly as Chris eased himself down into the soapy water; he felt like a piece of meat, as if he were on display…and with Blake he actually liked it. “Jesus.”

Chris decided to take Blake’s reaction as a compliment and not blasphemy because it was easier on his mind, but as soon as Blake knelt down at the head of the tub behind Chris’s shoulders, Chris honestly wasn’t thinking of much. Strong, sure hands began to trail along his shoulder blades, kneading firmly yet gently and soothing, and Chris sighed into the touch, relaxing his weary muscles and psyche and putting himself into Blake’s loving and capable hands.

He must have mumbled something as he let his eyes close and his mind drift into the pleasure, because there was Blake’s breath on the back of his neck, hot and intimate and just as soothing as the bathwater. “Why would you think I’d disappear?” Blake queried, pulling himself closer to Chris yet staying well out of the tub, snaking an arm down the younger man’s chest to playfully toy with a nipple. “And leave this fine piece of ass?” Chris tried to chuckle but it quickly devolved into a moan as Blake pulled at the lobe of his ear with his teeth, virtually attacking Chris’s ear with his mouth.

Blake’s voice went soft then, as his hand trailed southward, down underneath the surface of the water to take hold of Chris’s erection. “I might not have all the right words, but I’m not gonna leave you.”

“Guess I’m stuck with you then.” Chris nearly growled out the words in his throat, thrusting his hips up into Blake’s touch, watching the ripples of the water form in time with the rhythmic stroking of Blake’s hand on his cock. Blake was getting his shirt wet, the bathwater lapping up his sleeve and that really couldn’t be comfortable, but from the heavy panting in Chris’s ear and the feathered kisses along his neck the older man didn’t seem to mind.

“I mean it, Chris,” Blake’s voice was barely above a whisper and full of emotion. The hand still resting on Chris’s shoulder squeezed slightly, and Chris brought up his own hand from underneath the water to grasp it, just keep in contact with his boyfriend. “I want to be here for you when you need me…however you need me.”

Leaning his head back to look his boyfriend in the eyes, Chris flashed a dirty seductive smile that no one else but Blake ever saw. “Right now, I really need you in this tub,” came Chris’s reply, his eyes full of yearning.

Matching the smile with one of his own, a glint in his eyes far from innocent, Blake obliged, pulling his damp shirt up over his head and tossing off his pants in near record time. He had planned this for Chris, wanted to make Chris feel better in some way since he had completely failed at verbal comfort; and hell, he could get something out of it this way as well. He stared down at Chris, standing in the tub for a moment before he sank in himself, drinking in the sight of his waiting boyfriend, cock so hard its head poked out of the surface of the water, his hips nearly pulsing in anticipation. Always rather chivalrous and never one to leave someone waiting, Blake sank down to his knees, effectively straddling Chris’s waist as he tried to fit in the spaces not already occupied by his boyfriend.

The fit was tight, with smooth, slippery porcelain pressed against Blake’s calves and Chris’s long, muscular legs peeking out of the water at the other end of the tub, but then Chris’s hands were on the small of Blake’s back and Blake’s lips were against Chris’s damp neck and neither man was complaining about the fit. Chris’s hands roamed everywhere, fingers tickling at every bone along Blake’s spine, large, familiar palms rubbing against shoulder blades, pulling Blake closer to him. Blake was attacking Chris’s neck with long, lingering kisses, gauging Chris’s reaction from the moans coming from his mouth.

And then a finger slipped into the cleft of Blake’s ass, hot and wet and slightly wrinkled, and Blake found himself gasping against the skin of Chris’s neck, rolling his hips back for more contact. Emboldened by Blake’s encouragement, Chris’s finger slipped inside of him, aided by the bathwater and Blake’s own eagerness. His eyes drifted shut as the tight heat of Blake filled his senses, the older man breathing heavily against his neck, everything hot all around him as another finger joined it, slowly stretching his boyfriend and causing the absolute best noises to come out of the other man. Blake was rolling his hips back into Chris’s touch, shuddering and muttering a string of affectionate yet definitely dirty words into Chris’s skin. His cock pressed underneath his boyfriend’s ribcage and God, Chris was making it hard to remember this was supposed to be about him.

“Fuck, Chris,” Blake was panting into his boyfriend’s skin, little thrusts against wet skin making noises that, at any other time would have stirred snarky laughter. “Just fuck me already…”

Chris said nothing, just raised his free hand to Blake’s face, caressing the stubbled cheek with the pads of his fingertips as he removed his fingers from inside Blake and replaced them with his cock in one motion, fluid as the bathwater sloshing all around them. Blake thought he would come apart right there, moaning uncontrollably from the sudden movement, shutting his eyes tight and concentrating on the feeling of Chris’s dick inside of him. 

“Baby, don’t close your eyes.” Chris’s hand moved to cup Blake’s chin and force him to look at the other man, groaning with lust himself as he watched Blake’s lip nearly tremble over the sensation. Chris couldn’t ever really stop looking at his boyfriend, couldn’t help stealing glances when Blake was making his music – noise to anyone else – and he seemed almost like a force of nature. He loved to wake up well before both Blake and the dawn, not caring how exhausted he’d be later, so long as he was able to watch the other man sleeping, nearly not breathing for fear of waking him. But more than all that he loved to look at Blake when they had sex, the way his eyes tightened, the skin puckering into sexy little crow’s feet as he came, his mouth just hanging open, like he’s singing but so, so not like that at all.

And he loved to watch Blake watch him, locking their eyes in a stare that was near electric and turned Chris on when he was inside Blake more than anything else could. He thrust up, sliding in a little deeper as he went, snickering to himself as Blake’s eyes flew open and his mouth choked out a gasp.

“Fuck!” Blake found himself shouting, pushing back against Chris’s thrust, his thighs tightening around Chris’s hips. “God, Chris, I love you.”

His breath came out in a shuddering moan, and Chris couldn’t help but chuckle. “I love you, too,” he said, and squeezed Blake’s ass as an assertion of the fact. “And I don’t need you to have all the right words for me or for you to go to all these lengths.” Chris’s own breath was coming in pants now, and from the look on Blake’s face as Chris fucked him, he wasn’t sure how much of this was permeating his boyfriend’s brain. But he had to say it, had to get it out or it could fester and rot away the love they shared exactly the way Blake always feared. “Just…just be here for me. Just don’t ever disappear.”

“I won’t,” Blake promised between gasps; Chris was driving in deeper now, thrusting just against the spot within Blake that made his knees buckle, that made his breath shallow. “I won’t.” The last word out of Blake’s mouth devolved into a moan as his body pitched forward, overcome with sensation. He was close, so close, and yet he didn’t want it to end, didn’t want to break the physical connection with his lover, especially not now after what Chris said to him.

A soft kiss against his temple, hot sensual lips against flesh, and Chris moved a hand around Blake’s body from his ass along a tense hipbone and grazing against his cock. He finally took hold, reveling in the hot, velvety skin there, and thrust hard into Blake as he stroked him, smiling at the sounds Blake made that indicated he was either very close to orgasm or he was about to be murdered. Chris didn’t know how soundproof the girls’ bathroom was or for how long and how far Blake bribed them to stay away, but from the tightness in his balls and his own breath growing shallow he really hoped they weren’t interrupted any time soon.

Blake was keening now, making little, pleading noises into Chris’s neck, nearly begging his boyfriend for release. “Oh, Chris,” his breath was hot and the words stuck to Chris’s sweaty skin, and only then did he realize they would probably need yet another bath after this was all through.” Baby, fuck…make me come…”

Chris answered with a breathy sigh and a squeeze of Blake’s cock, lingering on the upstroke and twisting on the crown and that was all it took to send Blake over the edge. He came while nearly shouting into Chris’s shoulder, trying not to leave marks with his teeth but damn, with the way Chris fucked him it made it hard not to want to tear everything apart and mark Chris as his. Blake’s cock jerked in his boyfriend’s hand, spilling himself into the cooled bathwater and against Chris’s chest, his entire body tensing and going rigid.

His legs clenched against Chris’s muscular frame, crushing him and making the younger man feel surrounded by Blake in more ways than one. All this tension, all the tightness of Blake’s body all around him sent Chris overboard, thrusting with abandon into Blake as he came, shouting out Blake’s name in a short, sensual staccato.

Feeling spent and worn out and thoroughly fucked, Blake wrapped his arms around Chris’s shoulders, sighing softly as his boyfriend slid out from inside him. The bathwater around them had turned cool and it was chilling both of them; the candles had all gone out or melted into a waxy mess on the bathroom vanity. But even still, neither man dared to move, enjoying the thrilling tingle underneath their skin and the feel of their chests against one another, hearts beating in tandem.

Blake nuzzled against Chris’s shoulder, nose brushing against the stubble of his jawline, as he broke the contented silence between them. “We can talk about it if you want,” he said quietly; he knew that this wasn’t going to make Chris’s fears go away, it wasn’t going to make his little blue phone ring with good news or give thirty two people their lives back. And though he’d still have no idea what to say to make any of that pain go away, Blake wanted Chris to know that he was here to talk, to listen…to just be there.

Chris’s hands danced along Blake’s spine, rubbing against the goosebumps prickling against his skin from the cooled water. “We don’t have to now,” he said simply, and placed a tender kiss against Blake’s forehead.


	10. …If He’s Married Or Other Insane Variations Of Being Unavailable

> **Chapter Ten  
>  …If He’s Married Or Other Insane Variations Of Being Unavailable**
> 
> **_May 2007_**   
> 

“You know, you could have told your boyfriend that you’re single.”

Blake could tell even over the brutally informal cell phone that Chris was doing that thing, the one where he was pretending to be aloof and not care about the answer when in reality it was eating him up inside. He’d done this before, when he plastered on a smile during a commercial break and insisted to Blake that he was glad to go home that night, so long as Blake still held on in the competition. Blake hated when he did this; during Chris’s elimination Blake held all the emotion for the both of them, hugged twice as hard, shed twice as many tears. Now he was thousands of miles away and that was just too much of a worry. Besides Blake had no idea what he was talking about.

“Or that you’re straight. That was definitely something I thought I’d be informed of.” There was a biting tone to Chris’s voice, a harsh resentment that made Blake cringe. “What in the hell is going on here, Blake?”

A little shocked to hear these accusations out of the blue from Chris, Blake shifted his weight from one foot to the other, glancing around quickly for any eavesdroppers and finding none. “Well, from the goodbye fuck you gave me Wednesday night, I’m pretty sure I’m neither of those.” His grin turned positively naughty, he wished Chris could see it now. “And might I add at this point Christopher: thank you, because right now I’m just lucky I’m not sitting in this commercial.”

He got a chuckle from Chris on that one, and that was a good sign: the younger man could never keep a temper once he started laughing, and Blake had the special talent to make Chris laugh until he couldn’t stop. “You have no idea what’s been spreading about you online, do you,” Chris said.

That was pretty strange; Blake didn’t know Chris to be that interested in Hollywood gossip short of what over-privileged pseudo-celebrity he was connected to this week. “Thought Sligh was the choice lurker at Vote For The Worst,” Blake said warily.

Except this wasn’t as dismissible as idle gossip on some innocuous forum or a rogue blogger. And that was why Chris couldn’t just let this go, not with a clear conscience. “This came from Kristi,” he said, and immediately Blake’s heart sank. This conversation was not going to go well.

“Geez, Rich, don’t tell me you’re a Blaker Girl,” Blake snickered. Even so, he couldn’t at least try to bring a little levity into the situation.

Chris’s tone turned harsh, biting; this was apparently not the time to joke with him. “Don’t fucking start with me.” Chris’s voice was up two notches from before, a fair warning to Blake to get serious or get the hell off the phone. “You told her what to put in those messages, right? Did you approve this? Tell me you didn’t –“ He cut himself off, pinching at the bridge of his nose as Blake nervously tapped his fingers against his Sidekick on the other end of the line. “I don’t know if I ever want to know the answer…do I, Blake?”

With his brow creased in confusion and worry, Blake tried to keep his voice as serious and sympathetic as possible. He had dealt with Chris’s anger before, been able to diffuse his short temper with a soft touch and heated kisses, two sure-fire ways to make Chris completely forget why he was angry in the first place. But he couldn’t implement either of those now, with Chris being so many miles away and the rehearsals Blake was already ten minutes late for seemed to drag on forever now that Chris’s presence no longer made them bearable. It would be a test of his resolve to make sure Chris didn’t fly off the handle thousands of miles away.

I didn’t…” he began, sighing heavily. “I didn’t tell Kristi to say that, no. But I trust her to deal with this stuff,” he added quickly, hoping to divert any choice words Chris might have had about Kristi. “She knows what she’s doing, and if she thinks this is the best thing right now –“

“- Then you trust her judgment, I get it.” Chris sounded frustrated but defeated, the sudden sadness in his voice making Blake wish he could travel though the phone line, wrap his arms around the other man’s broad shoulders, hold him until the hurt started to ebb away. Losing the physical contact with Chris was the hardest thing about the separation: but it wasn’t just missing the sex, the feeling of completeness as Chris fucked him, like a silver basin filling with water and spilling over in a rush. It was the little things he missed most, a leg rubbing up against his own, how Chris’s fingers curved over Blake’s shoulder to squeeze gently when he not-so-accidentally bumped into him in the halls.

That would have been how Blake would have handled this situation: a fuck and a tight embrace until the morning. But as it stood now…Blake had no idea what to do.

“I didn’t say I liked the idea of it,” Blake clarified. He knew this confession wouldn’t help matters any but it wouldn’t hurt them either and he at least had to let Chris know where he stood on the subject. Blake wasn’t a liar if he could help it, but the position that this competition put him in – the position both of the men were in – well, the truth would have particularly made the teenage girl demographic ecstatic. Or their flirty soccer moms, for that matter. “I’ll talk to Kristi about this, tell her that my personal life is not up for discussion with twelve year olds.”

“You don’t have to do that,” Chris protested, his voice dropping down to a tone of intimacy that made Blake feel like he was right there in the room with him, breath hot on his neck. It made Blake’s mind repeat the words “my personal life” over again with more of a greedy, possessive inflection. “Whatever’s been said has been said; if she takes anything back now it’s gonna look like you’re hiding something.”

A brief flash of anger coursed through Blake, frustrated that he actually was hiding something, something beautiful and alive and more real to him than anything ever had been before. And despite his boyfriend being right, there was nothing either of them could do about this now. He was certainly going to have a talk with Kristi about any future developments, tell her to keep mum about anything else she hasn’t already uncovered. The inner publicist in her would protest, argue with Blake that no matter how much he wished for it the votes weren’t all about the music. But the friend inside Kristi, the one that used to make hundreds of flyers for Blake’s Seattle performances and buy three copies of anything he made because she was so proud of him…that friend would understand. Blake truly hoped that part of her would win out over her more professional side.

“I love you, Chris,” the words came as a shock to Blake’s ears as he was thinking it but hadn’t meant to blurt it out like that. Even though they both knew Blake was far from being single or straight, it created a barrier to Chris he wasn’t familiar with, a space farther than the miles now between them. He couldn’t put his arm around Blake’s shoulders and truly mean it; he had to watch his tongue during interviews for fear that something both disastrous and wonderful might slip.

It was Chris’s desire to break this barrier, to cross over the rift between Hollywood reality and reality that was real, that made him call Blake right before the commercial shoot and confront him on this. And Blake couldn’t blame him one bit.

Chris sighed on the other end of the line, but a contented sigh, one that couldn’t even mask his smile over a phone line. “I know,” he said with amusement and it relieved Blake like nothing else, that it wasn’t resentment or annoyance but a thin veil of happiness behind Chris’s words. “I love you, too. It just…it fucking sucked seeing that, you know? Though I guess it’ll suck even more to have to live up to that claim.”

“You sayin’ I can’t act ‘single and straight,’ Christopher?” Blake put his hand on a cocked hip in indignation even though no one but the boom mic guy was around to see it. “I’ll have you know that millions of girls all over the country are thoroughly convinced that I’m going to marry them.”

That got a full laugh from Chris, and Blake envisioned a bright, wide smile, open mouth, small neat rows of teeth Blake had taken to counting with his tongue. He licked his lips hungrily at the memory. “So we’re cool?” he asked Chris as his laughter faded a bit. “No lingering resentment that’ll one day turn to anger – no sudden desire to prove Kristi wrong on national TV?” Blake grew insecure quickly at the silence on the other end, and he asked again, less sure of himself than before. “We’re okay, right? Chris?”

The sound of Chris’s voice, playful and warm and so utterly _Chris_ it made Blake’s heart ache, soothed his anxiety immediately. “As long as you remember that you’ve already made out your marriage plans.” His tone was joking but intimate, a soft trailing on his words that anyone else would attribute to his Virginian drawl but Blake knew better. “I should probably go,” he sounded genuinely disappointed that he wouldn’t be able to stick around to hear Blake’s calculated retort, to get those extra seconds to listen to his voice. “Someone’s been trying to pin a mic on me for five minutes now.”

“I feel you,” Blake replied, the wide smile spreading across his face threatening to divide his face in two. “I’ll call you later, Rich. And…” he lowered his voice as a producer in an expensive suit and a scowl walked by within earshot. “…I love you. You, and only you.”

No matter how many times it was expressed between them, by words, by a knowing glance or a heated touch that always led to more, Blake never got tired of saying that he loved Chris. And Chris never got tired of hearing it. “I love you, too,” Chris said softly in response. “My crazy, bouncy, amazing, straight and single Bshorty.”


	11. …If He’s A Selfish Jerk, A Bully, Or A Really Big Freak

> **Chapter Eleven  
>  …If He’s A Selfish Jerk, A Bully, Or A Really Big Freak**
> 
> **_May 2007_**   
> 

Blake didn’t so much welcome Chris back to L.A. as he did lock him in the apartment they had once shared and planned to practically throw the younger man’s boxers out the window.

“You know,” Chris was gleefully smug, grinning as his boyfriend busied himself with unbuttoning Chris’s shirt, reveling in the feel of the hot skin underneath. “I still haven’t said hi to Jordin since I got back. She’s going to be angry.”

A bemused growl came from the back of Blake’s throat; he had pushed the shirt off of Chris’s shoulders and pressed his forehead against his skin, kissing and touching everywhere while making short work of the man’s jeans. “Fuck her,” he snapped; Chris chuckled, fully enjoying how Blake was reacting to their reunion. Flirty, insistent teeth raked against a nipple, and Chris was no longer chuckling but moaning lustfully.

Obviously pleased with the response, Blake shoved Chris’s jeans down off of his hips, immediately taking his hardening cock in hand and stroking it roughly. “Or better yet, fuck me.” Lips traced a lingering line up from Chris’s chest to his collarbone, his neck, the spot along his jawline that the younger man could never resist. “Fuck me, Christopher,” he requested again, softer this time, almost pleading, as he swirled a thumb over Chris’s crown.

“Blake…” Chris groaned out. Giving in to his growing desire for the boyfriend he hadn’t been able to touch for weeks, he captured Blake’s lips with his own, snaking a tongue inside quickly to taste him. It had been long, far too long since he had gotten to experience Blake, to really be with him and not just talk on the phone, or vicariously watch him on television. He needed more than just phone calls, he realized, as Blake’s arms pulled their bodies flush against one another, Chris’s naked body a strong contrast to Blake’s t-shirt and cargos. He needed the comfort of his boyfriend’s embrace that had become second nature to him.

Those lips exhaled a chuckle against Blake’s mouth as the older man, seemingly impatient with the slower pace Chris was setting, grabbed roughly at his boyfriend’s hands to tug at Blake’s shirt, pull at the waistband of his pants, just get them both naked as fast as possible. “Demanding little fucker, ain’t you,” Chris said playfully against Blake’s cheek; he liked the forcefulness, fuck he’d be lying if he didn’t want this as bad as Blake did, but Blake was just much more obvious about it all. Chris thought back to two weeks prior, and wondered how in the hell the whole world didn’t see Blake singing that song for him.

“Oh, you know it,” Blake’s words were more of a moan as Chris’s large hands pulled Blake’s shirt over his head, the cool air of the room rushing around him momentarily before his chest met with the heat of Chris’s body full force. “Just one of my many endearing personality quirks.” He sucked in a deep breath through his teeth, lips curling into a dirty, satisfied smile as Chris kissed down his body, tongue toying with a nipple, his hands busy with the fly of Blake’s pants. “Demanding, bossy, self-centered…Jesus, I sound like a real asshole, don’t I.”

Chris grinned against the waistline of Blake’s pants; his fly was open now, Blake’s more than ample ass the only thing keeping them on his hips, his cock peeking out from the zipper in an almost friendly manner. “You forgot judgmental,” Chris quipped, Virginian drawl seeping in underneath Blake’s skin, crawling around the base of his spine and causing him to shudder. “And untrusting. Selfish.” Chris slid his hands down past the waistband onto Blake’s ass, bringing him closer to Chris. Flicking out a playful tongue, Chris flattened it out against the base of Blake’s dick, trailing upward deliberately, pulling away slowly so that only the tip of his tongue teased at Blake’s head. “And let’s not forget cocky.”

Hissing out a belabored breath, Blake resisted the urge to pull Chris’s head forward and fuck his mouth, show him how cocky Blake could really be with his boyfriend on his knees. He glanced down at Chris, eyes darkening with lust, as he kissed and licked at the sensitive flesh, and emitted a low growl from the back of his throat. “Fuck yeah…” Blake muttered, licking his lips as he spied Chris’s own cock, hard and dripping and positively tantalizing to Blake’s eyes. It certainly wasn’t fair that Chris was having all the fun right now. “Well, what about you?” Blake asked with a hint of a mischievous smirk on his face; the smirk faded when Chris pulled away from him, waiting palms resting on Blake’s thighs, his head tilted inquisitively. Fuck, Blake thought; that wasn’t supposed to make him _stop._

“What about me?” Chris asked the question playfully, one rogue finger tracing a circle along Blake’s skin, teasing way too much for his boyfriend’s liking. “I’m no asshole, B; I’m the perfect Southern gentleman.” Chris grinned wide, and it caused Blake to purse his lips in mock resentment. If he wasn’t having so much fun with where this conversation was going, he would have pulled Chris up to his feet after that line and kissed him hard, proven to Chris and himself how wrong of a presumption that was.

“Real Southern gentlemen don’t tease half as much as you, babe.” Blake tried to hold back a soft moan as Chris leaned in and kissed the head of his cock again to accentuate Blake’s point. “Real Southern gentlemen don’t act all prim and proper by day, a fucking fantasy for the teen magazines, and then turn around and suck dick by night.”

Chris rose to his feet, hungry eyes locked on Blake’s the entire time, trapping them in his stare. His smile was naughty, downright devious in the corner of his lips. “They do when they suck dick as good as I do.” Chris meant it as a joke, but from personal and exclusive experience Blake knew he was telling the honest truth.

With a daring look challenging Chris to prove it, Blake walked backwards slowly, keeping eye contact as he stumbled slightly, gravity and motion working their magic on his pants as they slid off his hips to his ankles. He stopped when the back of his knees met the cool, starched cotton of the mattress. _Their_ bed, Blake thought possessively; those simple sheets could tell enough tales of heated, passionate nights and gentle, loving mornings to fill a library. He beckoned Chris over with a look that could burn up the Artic: eyebrows raised, eyes half-lidded and shimmering with golden lust. The kind of look that would warrant a harsher TV rating should he utilize it the next day during the show.

Matching Blake’s look with one of eagerness and pure yearning, Chris advanced quickly, closing the gap between them as Blake kicked off the cargos and settled down on the bed, cock standing as tall and imposing as Blake’s ego. Both, as it seemed, inevitably grew with some due attention from Chris Richardson.

“I’m not that good of a guy,” Chris conceded, knees nearly buckling as they touched the edge of the bed and he spied Blake gingerly touching himself, fingers trailing down to his balls and disappearing beneath him to a place Chris was getting to know very well. “I’m supposed to be at the hotel right now; producers’ orders.”

“Yeah, ‘cause you’ve been a fucking boy scout until now about what the producers want you to do.” Even with his own fingers roughly inside of him, stretching and readying his body for his waiting boyfriend, Blake could still dole out a healthy blow of sarcasm. His eyes darkened with lust as he let out a low groan, much less because of the sensations he was giving himself than the exciting, enticing look in Chris’s eyes as he watched Blake finger himself. Christ on a Khaoss pad, Blake thought as his body passed out a shudder; he could get off just watching Chris watch him with those eyes.

Chris wanted to smile but he seemed incapable of it at the moment, his entire mind paralyzed by the sight of what Blake was doing to himself, the only thought in his head that he wanted to be there – oh, right there – and then he had to remind himself that he would be, very soon. “I care too much sometimes.” Chris approached Blake on the bed, his stare, his stance, nearly everything about him reminding Blake of a hunter. An animal stalking his prey.

“I don’t always listen. Hell, I can’t even remember what I said in all the interviews I’ve been through. I speed; I take girls’ phone numbers and never call.” He finally reached Blake, settling himself between the older man’s legs and effectively invading his space. The sudden closeness startled Blake, a soft gasp escaping his lips, as his mind mused with the thought that he was partly the cause of all those ignored phone numbers.

“I lie,” Chris said in a much softer voice. He inched his face into Blake’s personal space, feeling the heat radiating between their bodies. He reached underneath of Blake, holding onto his wrist and replacing his boyfriend’s industrious fingers with his own. “I lie to a lot of people: fans, friends. I’m lying to my parents when I say you’re just a friend.” Blake was panting now, Chris’s fingers dug deep to the knuckle and curving just so. He nearly came when Chris leaned in, breath hot on his neck, fingers twisting so far he thought Chris must have sprained his wrist completing it. “Good guys don’t lie like I do.”

With an eager groan, Blake moved his head to the side to capture Chris’s mouth, plunging his tongue inside, wrapping his arms around his boyfriend’s broad shoulders, pulling him closer. Electrified by Chris’s words, Blake explored everywhere inside Chris’s mouth with his tongue, feeling a rush from their intimacy that could only be compared to the feeling of being onstage, performing to millions – and even then, he was a persona on stage, a package with a voice and a mischievous smirk that the audience loved. When Blake was with Chris, he wasn’t playing a role or keeping a part of himself from view. He was completely open to be an asshole and a jerk around Chris…to just be himself.

“Well, fuck Chris,” Blake breathed out through belabored pants as Chris reached over with his free hand for the bottle of lube still tucked away on the bedside table, untouched, almost as if it were waiting for the younger man’s return to the room. Chris emptied the bottle into his palm, stroking himself slick in time with the movement of his fingers inside of Blake, and if there ever were a time Blake wished he had a camera on him… “Do you kick puppies in your spare time, too?”

Chris’s fingers retracted and an instinctive complaint rose up in Blake’s throat; but it subsided when he felt Chris’s cock prodding hard at his entrance, and Chris’s voice, unnaturally guttural, in his ear. “No, I fuck beatboxers in my spare time,” he replied, pushing in, breaking that point of no return that both men so deliciously loved to cross. Blake’s mind wanted to make a quick retort about how he hoped Chris wasn’t including Doug E. Fresh in that category, but the feeling of Chris inside him, filling him, routinely caused his brain to temporarily take a coffee break.

Blake rolled his head back against the headboard, moaning shamelessly as Chris eased himself in, inch by inch as he always did, maximizing and prolonging that slow burn Blake reveled in. “God, Blake,” he muttered, and only then did he realize he was trembling slightly. “Missed this…ah, fuck, missed you so much.” He kissed at Blake’s temple, trailed his lips along his hairline down to the ear, flicking his tongue around the curves, barely able to control himself as he pushed himself to the hilt inside of his boyfriend, just pulsing there.

“Missed you…” Blake repeated the sentiment, awash with sensation and not quite able to form his own coherent thoughts at the moment. The weeks apart nearly killed both of them; at least they would have the tour soon, four months of kicking Sligh and Phil off a tour bus, of pretending it was completely normal for best friends to prefer getting a hotel room together rather than apart. “Fucking love you…”

Chris laughed against Blake’s skin as he thrust suddenly and caused Blake’s last word to dissolve into a near wail. “I did accidentally step on Tommy once; I woke up to take a piss and all the lights were out. Poor buddy looked like he resented it for a full week.” Chris grazed a hand down Blake’s chest, shifting his weight to one arm, fingers trailing down until they reached sensitive flesh. He wondered how something like Blake’s cock could be so hard yet the skin feel so soft under his fingertips, the contrast of it all just perfect in his head.

He heard Blake laughing underneath him, or as much laughing as the older man could do with Chris deep inside him, thrusting and grazing his prostate, nearly making him beg for more. “Guess we’re both assholes then,” he replied lightly. He wanted to look into Chris’s eyes forever, keep that connection between them that developed so fast and so passionately in the few months they’ve known each other. He couldn’t believe that all of this happened, that he could receive so much from a television show, an audition from which he had expected so little. He wondered what he would have ever done with his life had he slept in instead of taking the chance in Seattle, if none of this ever happened…if he had never even met the man he felt so deeply for now.

Giving a lustful grunt in response, Chris locked his eyes with Blake’s a deep fire behind a springtime green, his thrusts growing shallow, more frequent. “Yeah, we’re both real jerks,” he joked, a smirk rising in the corner of his mouth, mischief and fun creeping in with all of the lust building inside of him.

Blake grabbed onto Chris’s ass with both hands palming him, pushing him in deep and sudden with a gasp. “Made…for each other…” he made out; he could hardly stand it anymore, it was getting to be too much…he could feel the tension rising in his body, the familiar feeling right before he came, sensations that only grew more intense with Chris inside of him, reaching his limit as well.

Chris let out a deep groan as Blake pushed him all the way inside, burying him deep with Blake’s cock, hard and nearly trembling for release, sandwiched between them. All of this sensation, the heat of Blake’s cock pressed against his belly and leaking into his hand, the tight hold his boyfriend’s body had on his own dick, and rough yet familiar and comforting hands holding him there, pushing him inside…it was overwhelming him. Soon Chris found his head rolling back, his entire body shaking with release. “God…” he moaned as he came, stars quickly filling his vision. “I love you…”

“Ah, fuck yes Christopher…” Blake knew all too well the signs of Chris finally reaching orgasm, the trembling in his limbs, the pulsing of that vein in his neck that made Blake want to reach out and trace it with his tongue, feel the blood rush through it underneath his lover’s skin. “Oh, God, I – oh, fuck…” he shouted suddenly, his cock jerking in Chris’s hold, spilling over the both of them.

Blake’s mind was still reeling, the buzz rumbling happily underneath his skin as Chris leaned down and pressed tender lips against his forehead. “I love you,” Chris said again, the tenor of his voice mixing under the skin with his post-orgasm high, and Blake let out a coo of approval. Jesus, a man to fuck him senseless and then tell him he loved him afterwards…he wondered how he ever got so lucky.

Licking his lips and letting out a sated breath as Chris slipped out of him, Blake smiled, an uncontrollable grin spreading on his face. “We’re sticky,” he pointed out happily, moving his hands from Chris’s ass to trail up and down the other man’s spine.

Chris smiled against Blake’s forehead and rested his frame carefully down atop his boyfriend, loving the feeling of enveloping him, of being so close to him it almost hurt. He had no idea when all of these emotions came over him, that swelling in his heart at the mere thought of Blake that was quickly becoming as familiar to him as breathing. This whole competition surprised him; that he could meet someone here from across the country who would so wonderfully turn his world upside down, that could provide the answer to all the questions he asked himself for over a decade. He owed more than just a career to this competition’s credit – he owed a love, owed the discovery of his very identity.

“That,” he mumbled into Blake’s skin, feeling their heartbeats slow as their breathing got back to normal levels. “Was a much better welcome than anything Jordin would have said.”

“Oh, you better believe it,” came his boyfriend’s reply, fingers tickling at Chris’s hipbone. They were sweaty and downright disgusting at this point, the nagging logical part of Blake’s brain begging for a shower, but he didn’t want to move and disturb the warm, hazy peace that had fallen over the two. A dopey yet unashamed smile crossed over his face as he reminisced on a conversation he had with Gina Glocksen, when he had worried about the sincerity of his relationship with Chris, back when Blake wanted to push away only to find himself closer than ever before.

> _Gina waved a finger in the beatboxer’s direction, a matter-of-fact look piercing through her glasses. “Blake Colin Lewis,” she said, somehow channeling his mother to a tee. “You better not be planning to be That Guy. Don’t be That Guy.”_
> 
> _Although Blake felt slightly intimidated by Gina’s tone of voice, his curiosity had gotten the better of him. “What’s ‘That Guy’?”_
> 
> _“The guy who bails on someone he really cares about because he’s afraid.” Blake’s eyes grew wide and he swallowed hard; he had never thought about it like that before. “Don’t be That Guy, Blake, because everyone hates That Guy. Especially himself.” That imposing finger poked Blake in the chest, Gina’s face disguising a level of caring underneath her stern expression._
> 
> _She let a smile peek out from her lips, her eyes glinting with amusement. She had a feeling that, deep down, Blake knew all of this, and he’d choose the right path in time. “And don’t,” she warned, “think about all those other questions you’ve got in that bleached head of yours.” She knocked on Blake’s skull for emphasis, and Blake rolled his eyes; he wasn’t approving of her methods, but he still paid close attention to the message. “It doesn’t matter if he doesn’t want to marry you or if he disappears on you, or anything like that. There’s really only one question you need to be sure of the answer.”_
> 
> _“I await your unending wisdom,” Blake joked as Gina put a friendly arm around his shoulders. She pointed to one of the myriad of video screens set to the cameras recording the stage: Chris was in dress rehearsals, bright smile on his face as he moved around the stage, and Blake held his breath at the raw beauty and emotion just looking at Chris evoked in him. Gina leaned in and whispered into Blake’s ear, his eyes never leaving the sight of the younger man rehearsing with more confidence than he ever had before._
> 
> _“Does he make you happy?”_

“You do,” Blake mumbled, eyes closed in half-reverie, the feel of Chris’s warm body all around him lulling him into a contented state.

“Come again?” asked Chris, picking his head up from the crook of Blake’s shoulder high enough to look his boyfriend in the eye, his face holding a quizzical expression.

Blake smiled, the familiar green eyes and perfect face filling his vision. “You make me happy, Christopher,” he said simply, and placed a tender kiss against the other man’s lips. “And that’s all that matters.”


End file.
